Measurement of the Inelastic Proton-Proton Cross Section at √s=13 TeV with the ATLAS Detector at the LHC

Abstract

We thank CERN for the very successful operation of the LHC, as well as the support staff from our institutions without whom ATLAS could not be operated efficiently. We acknowledge the support of ANPCyT, Argentina; YerPhI, Armenia; ARC, Australia; BMWFW and FWF, Austria; ANAS, Azerbaijan; SSTC, Belarus; CNPq and FAPESP, Brazil; NSERC, NRC and CFI, Canada; CERN; CONICYT, Chile; CAS, MOST and NSFC, China; COLCIENCIAS, Colombia; MSMT CR, MPO CR and VSC CR, Czech Republic; DNRF and DNSRC, Denmark; IN2P3-CNRS, CEA-DSM/IRFU, France; GNSF, Georgia; BMBF, HGF, and MPG, Germany; GSRT, Greece; RGC, Hong Kong SAR, China; ISF, I-CORE and Benoziyo Center, Israel; INFN, Italy; MEXT and JSPS, Japan; CNRST, Morocco; FOM and NWO, Netherlands; RCN, Norway; MNiSW and NCN, Poland; FCT, Portugal; MNE/IFA, Romania; MES of Russia and NRC KI, Russian Federation; JINR; MESTD, Serbia; MSSR, Slovakia; ARRS and MIZS, Slovenia; DST/NRF, South Africa; MINECO, Spain; SRC and Wallenberg Foundation, Sweden; SERI, SNSF and Cantons of Bern and Geneva, Switzerland; MOST, Taiwan; TAEK, Turkey; STFC, United Kingdom; DOE and NSF, United States of America. In addition, individual groups and members have received support from BCKDF, the Canada Council, CANARIE, CRC, Compute Canada, FQRNT, and the Ontario Innovation Trust, Canada; EPLANET, ERC, FP7, Horizon 2020 and Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions, European Union; Investissements d'Avenir Labex and Idex, ANR, Region Auvergne and Fondation Partager le Savoir, France; DFG and AvH Foundation, Germany; Herakleitos, Thales and Aristeia programmes co-financed by EU-ESF and the Greek NSRF; BSF, GIF and Minerva, Israel; BRF, Norway; Generalitat de Catalunya, Generalitat Valenciana, Spain; the Royal Society and Leverhulme Trust, United Kingdom. The crucial computing support from all WLCG partners is acknowledged gratefully, in particular from CERN, the ATLAS Tier-1 facilities at TRIUMF (Canada), NDGF (Denmark, Norway, Sweden), CC-IN2P3 (France), KIT/GridKA (Germany), INFN-CNAF (Italy), NL-T1 (Netherlands), PIC (Spain), ASGC (Taiwan), RAL (UK) and BNL (USA), the Tier-2 facilities worldwide and large non-WLCG resource providers. ; This Letter presents a measurement of the inelastic proton-proton cross section using 60 μb−1 of pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy √s of 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Inelastic interactions are selected using rings of plastic scintillators in the forward region (2.0710−6, where MX is the larger invariant mass of the two hadronic systems separated by the largest rapidity gap in the event. In this ξ range the scintillators are highly efficient. For diffractive events this corresponds to cases where at least one proton dissociates to a system with MX>13 GeV. The measured cross section is compared with a range of theoretical predictions. When extrapolated to the full phase space, a cross section of 78.1±2.9 mb is measured, consistent with the inelastic cross section increasing with center-of-mass energy. ; ANPCyT ; YerPhI, Armenia ; Australian Research Council ; BMWFW, Austria ; Austrian Science Fund (FWF) ; Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences (ANAS) ; SSTC, Belarus ; National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) ; Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP) ; Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada ; NRC, Canada ; Canada Foundation for Innovation ; CERN ; Comision Nacional de Investigacion Cientifica y Tecnologica (CONICYT) ; Chinese Academy of Sciences ; Ministry of Science and Technology, China ; National Natural Science Foundation of China ; Departamento Administrativo de Ciencia, Tecnologia e Innovacion Colciencias ; Ministry of Education, Youth & Sports - Czech Republic Czech Republic Government ; DNRF, Denmark ; Danish Natural Science Research Council ; Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) ; CEA-DSM/IRFU, France ; GNSF, Georgia ; Federal Ministry of Education & Research (BMBF) ; HGF, Germany ; Max Planck Society ; Greek Ministry of Development-GSRT ; Hong Kong Research Grants Council ; Israel Science Foundation ; I-CORE, Israel ; Benoziyo Center, Israel ; Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) ; Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan (MEXT) Japan Society for the Promotion of Science ; CNRST, Morocco ; FOM (The Netherlands) Netherlands Government ; Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) Netherlands Government ; RCN, Norway ; Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Poland ; NCN, Poland ; Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology ; MNE/IFA, Romania ; Russian Federation ; NRC KI, Russian Federation ; JINR ; MESTD, Serbia ; MSSR, Slovakia ; Slovenian Research Agency - Slovenia ; MIZS, Slovenia ; DST/NRF, South Africa ; MINECO, Spain ; SRC, Sweden ; Wallenberg Foundation, Sweden ; SERI, Switzerland ; Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) ; Cantons of Bern and Geneva, Switzerland ; Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan ; Ministry of Energy & Natural Resources - Turkey ; United States Department of Energy (DOE) ; National Science Foundation (NSF) ; BCKDF, Canada ; Canada Council, Canada ; CANARIE, Canada ; CRC, Canada ; Compute Canada, Canada ; FQRNT ; Ontario Innovation Trust, Canada ; European Union (EU) ; European Union (EU) European Research Council (ERC) ; Horizon 2020, European Union ; French National Research Agency (ANR) ; Region Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes ; Fondation Partager le Savoir, France ; German Research Foundation (DFG) ; Alexander von Humboldt Foundation ; Herakleitos ; Thales programme ; Aristeia programme ; Greek Ministry of Development-GSRT ; US-Israel Binational Science Foundation ; German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development ; Minerva, Israel ; BRF, Norway ; Generalitat de Catalunya, Generalitat Valenciana, Spain ; Royal Society and Leverhulme Trust, United Kingdom ; Science & Technology Facilities Council (STFC) 1366825 ST/J004804/1 GRIDPP ST/N000307/1 ST/L006162/1 ST/K001329/1 ATLAS ATLAS ST/M000753/1 ST/N000463/1 ST/K001329/1 ST/J005533/1 ST/L000997/1 ST/L003449/1 PP/E000444/1 ; ICREA