Centrality categorization for Rp(d)+A in high-energy collisions
High-energy proton- and deuteron-nucleus collisions provide an excellent tool for studying a wide array of physics effects, including modifications of parton distribution functions in nuclei, gluon saturation, and color neutralization and hadronization in a nuclear environment, among others. All of these effects are expected to have a significant dependence on the size of the nuclear target and the impact parameter of the collision, also known as the collision centrality. In this article, we detail a method for determining centrality classes in p(d) + A collisions via cuts on the multiplicity at backward rapidity (i.e., the nucleus-going direction) and for determining systematic uncertainties in this procedure. For d + Au collisions at root s(NN) = 200 GeV we find that the connection to geometry is confirmed by measuring the fraction of events in which a neutron from the deuteron does not interact with the nucleus. As an application, we consider the nuclear modification factors Rp(d)+A, for which there is a bias in the measured centrality-dependent yields owing to auto correlations between the process of interest and the backward-rapidity multiplicity. We determine the bias-correction factors within this framework. This method is further tested using the HIJING Monte Carlo generator. We find that for d + Au collisions at root s(NN) = 200 GeV, these bias corrections are small and vary by less than 5% (10%) up to p(T) = 10 (20) GeV/c. In contrast, for p + Pb collisions at v root s(NN) = 5.02 TeV we find that these bias factors are an order of magnitude larger and strongly pT dependent, likely attributable to the larger effect of multiparton interactions.

title: Direct photons in Au+Au collisions measured with the PHENIX detector at RHIC
abstract: A major goal of experiments in heavy-ion physics is the characterization of the quark gluon plasma (QGP) produced in the collision of heavy ions at high energy. Direct photons are a particularly good probe of the produced medium because they do not interact strongly and so can escape the medium unmodified, carrying information about when the photon was produced. It is expected that direct photon contributions from different sources (QGP radiation, hard scattering, hadron gas radiation) dominate at different transverse momentum ranges. Low momentum direct photons are dominated by thermal radiation (both from the QGP and hadron gas), while high momentum direct photons dominantly come from hard parton scatterings in the initial collision. We present a summary of techniques to measure direct photons with the PHENIX detector, with a focus on low momentum direct photons through their external conversion to dilepton pairs.

title: Photon reconstruction in the ATLAS Inner Detector and Liquid Argon Barrel Calorimeter at the 2004 Combined Test Beam
abstract: The reconstruction of photons in the ATLAS detector is studied with data taken during the 2004 Combined Test Beam, where a full slice of the ATLAS detector was exposed to beams of particles of known energy at the CERN SPS. The results presented show significant differences in the longitudinal development of the electromagnetic shower between converted and unconverted photons as well as in the total measured energy. The potential to use the reconstructed converted photons as a means to precisely map the material of the tracker in front of the electromagnetic calorimeter is also considered. All results obtained are compared with a detailed Monte-Carlo simulation of the test-beam setup which is based on the same simulation and reconstruction tools as those used for the ATLAS detector itself.

title: The ATLAS TRT end-cap detectors
abstract: The ATLAS TRT end-cap is a tracking drift chamber using 245,760 individual tubular drift tubes. It is a part of the TRT tracker which consist of the barrel and two end-caps. The TRT end-caps cover the forward and backward pseudo-rapidity region 1.0 < vertical bar eta vertical bar < 2.0, while the TRT barrel central eta region vertical bar eta vertical bar < 1.0. The TRT system provides a combination of continuous tracking with many measurements in individual drift tubes ( or straws) and of electron identification based on transition radiation from fibers or foils interleaved between the straws themselves. Along with other two sub-systems, namely the Pixel detector and Semi Conductor Tracker (SCT), the TRT constitutes the ATLAS Inner Detector. This paper describes the recently completed and installed TRT end-cap detectors, their design, assembly, integration and the acceptance tests applied during the construction.

title: Structure functions for light nuclei
abstract: We discuss the nuclear EMC effect with particular emphasis on recent data for light nuclei including {sup 2}H, {sup 3}He, {sup 4}He, {sup 9}Be, {sup 12}C, and {sup 14}N. In order to verify the consistency of available data, we calculate the {chi}{sup 2} deviation between different data sets. We find a good agreement between the results from the NMC, SLAC E139, and HERMES experiments. However, our analysis indicates an overall normalization offset of about 2% in the data from the recent JLab E03-103 experiment with respect to previous data for nuclei heavier than {sup 3}He. We also discuss the extraction of the neutron/proton structure function ratio F{sub 2}{sup n}/F{sub 2}{sup p} from the nuclear ratios {sup 3}He/{sup 2}H and {sup 2}H/{sup 1}H. Our analysis shows that the E03-103 data on {sup 3}He/{sup 2}H require a renormalization of about 3% in order to be consistent with the F{sub 2}{sup n}/F{sub 2}{sup p} ratio obtained from the NMC experiment. After such a renormalization, the {sup 3}He data from the E03-103 and HERMES experiments are in a good agreement. Finally, we present a detailed comparison between data and model calculations, which include a description of the nuclear binding, Fermi motion, and off-shell correctionsmore » to the structure functions of bound proton and neutron, as well as the nuclear pion and shadowing corrections. Overall, a good agreement with the available data for all nuclei is obtained.« less

title: The electromagnetic calorimeter of the NOMAD experiment
abstract: A description is given of the NOMAD electromagnetic calorimeter, consisting of 875 lead-glass counters read out by two-stage photomultipliers and a low noise electronic chain. The detector operates in a 0.4 T magnetic field transverse to the counter axis. The paper discusses the design criteria, the lead-glass characteristics, the properties of the read out chain and provides a summary of the calorimeter performance.

title: Nuclear Effects in Neutrino Structure Functions
abstract: We discuss calculation of nuclear corrections to the structure functions for the deep‐inelastic scattering of muon and (anti)neutrino. Our approach includes a QCD description of the nucleon structure functions as well as the treatment of Fermi motion and nuclear binding, off‐shell correction to bound nucleon structure functions, nuclear pion excess and nuclear shadowing. We emphasize the dependence of nuclear effects on the type and C parity of (anti)neutrino structure functions. We also examine the interplay between different nuclear effects in the Adler and the Gross–Llewellyn‐Smith sum rules for nuclei.