Large-angle production of charged pions by 3 GeV/c - 12 GeV/c protons on carbon, copper and tin targets
Abstract
A measurement of the double-differential π production cross-section in proton--carbon, proton--copper and proton--tin collisions in the range of pion momentum 100 ≤ p < 800 and angle 0.35 θ <2.15 is presented. The data were taken with the HARP detector in the T9 beam line of the CERN PS. The pions were produced by proton beams in a momentum range from 3 to 12 hitting a target with a thickness of 5% of a nuclear interaction length. The tracking and identification of the produced particles was done using a small-radius cylindrical time projection chamber (TPC) placed in a solenoidal magnet. An elaborate system of detectors in the beam line ensured the identification of the incident particles. Results are shown for the double-differential cross-sections at four incident proton beam momenta (3 , 5 , 8 and 12 ).