DRF: Thesis SL-DRF-17-0741 - instn

DRF: Thesis SL-DRF-17-0741
RESEARCH FIELD
Nuclear physics / Corpuscular physics and outer space
TITLE
Drell-Yan and charmonium production processes in pion-nucleus interaction
ABSTRACT
In the Drell-Yan (DY) process a quark and an antiquark annihilate to produce a pair of leptons. The properties of the lepton pair give
access to the distributions of the quarks within the two interacting hadrons. The interaction between the two hadrons may also lead to the
production of J/psi mesons, a pair of charmed quark and antiquark. These two processes are different in nature. However, both cross
sections are a function of the density of the nuclear matter. They depend on the loss of energy of the partons before the interaction, on the
J/psi suppression after its creation and on the modification of the distributions of the partons in nuclei. In order to disentangle these
different effects, we propose a simultaneous analysis of the two processes by the same experiment.
The experimental data are being collected by the COMPASS experiment at CERN. COMPASS simultaneously measures Drell-Yan and
J/psi production processes using a pion beam and three targets with different atomic numbers. The PhD student will start his thesis by
analysing the data collected in 2015. He will have to evaluate and apply the corrections necessary to derive the relative cross sections for
each of the three targets used. He should take part in the preparation of the 2018 run and perform the analysis of the new data. During the
data taking he will be responsible for the operation of one of the particle detectors build by the IRFU.
A large part of his thesis work will be devoted to the interpretation of the data, which will take into account the most recent theoretical
developments. For this joint PhD thesis, the student will also work under the supervision of François Arleo from CNRS/LLR (Ecole
Polytechnique) who is an internationally recognised expert in this field. The phenomenological studies based on these data will make it
possible to clarify: (i) the amount of parton energy loss in nuclear matter, (ii) the universality of the parton distributions in deep-inelastic
scattering and in Drell-Yan, (iii) the dynamics of charmonium production in nuclear collisions.
LOCATION
Institut de recherche sur les lois fondamentales de l'univers
Service de Physique Nucléaire
Groupe COMPASS
Place: Saclay
Start date of the thesis: 01/10/2017
CONTACT PERSON
Stephane PLATCHKOV
CEA
DRF/IRFU/SPhN/COMPASS
IRFU/SPhN, bât. 703
CEA, Orme des merisiers
Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives
Institut national des sciences et techniques nucléaires
www­instn.cea.fr
1
F-91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex
France
Phone number: +33 1 69 08 74 59
Email: [email protected]
UNIVERSITY / GRADUATE SCHOOL
Paris-Saclay
PHENIICS
FIND OUT MORE
http://irfu.cea.fr/Sphn/Phocea/Vie_des_labos/Ast/ast_sstheme.php?id_ast=32
THESIS SUPERVISOR
Stephane PLATCHKOV
CEA
DRF/IRFU/SPhN/COMPASS
IRFU/SPhN, bât. 703
CEA, Orme des merisiers
F-91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex
France
Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives
Institut national des sciences et techniques nucléaires
www­instn.cea.fr
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