Inclusive Hadron Production in p+p Collisions at STAR

TL;DR

This paper reports measurements of inclusive hadron production cross sections in proton-proton collisions at 200 GeV, comparing results with pQCD calculations to improve understanding of pion fragmentation functions.

Contribution

First measurements of inclusive charged and neutral pion cross sections at STAR, providing data to constrain pion fragmentation functions and test pQCD predictions.

Findings

Good agreement between measured cross sections and pQCD calculations.

First preliminary results for neutral pion production near mid rapidity.

Data can help refine pion fragmentation functions.

Abstract

The STAR experiment at RHIC has measured a variety of inclusive hadron cross sections in $p+p$ collisions at Sqrt(s) = 200 GeV. Measurements of the differential cross section for inclusive charged pion production at mid rapidity and for inclusive neutral pion production at forward rapidity (3.0 < eta < 4.2) as well as the first preliminary result from STAR for the differential cross section for inclusive neutral pion production near mid rapidity are presented. These cross sections are compared to next-to-leading order perturbative QCD calculations and can provide constraints on the pion fragmentation functions. Good agreement between data and pQCD has been found for all three cross sections.