The yield of muon pairs in the invariant mass region 1<M<2.5 GeV/c^2 produced in heavy-ion collisions significantly exceeds the sum of the two expected contributions, Drell-Yan dimuons and muon pairs from the decays of D meson pairs. These sources properly account for the dimuons produced in proton-nucleus collisions. In this paper, we show that dimuons are also produced in excess in 158 A GeV In-In collisions. We furthermore observe, by tagging the dimuon vertices, that this excess is not due to enhanced D meson production, but made of {\em prompt} muon pairs, as expected from a source of thermal dimuons specific to high-energy nucleus-nucleus collisions. The yield of this excess increases significantly from peripheral to central collisions, both with respect to the Drell-Yan yield and to the number of nucleons participating in the collisions. Furthermore, the transverse mass distributions of the excess dimuons are well described by an exponential function, with inverse slope values around 190 MeV. The values are independent of mass and significantly lower than those found at masses below 1 GeV/c^2, rising there up to 250 MeV due to radial flow. This suggests the emission source of thermal dimuons above 1 GeV/c^2 to be of largely partonic origin, when radial flow has not yet built up.
The dimuon production in 200 GeV/nucleon O-U, O-Cu, S-U and p-U reactions is studied in function of transverse energy E T produced by the collision. The J / ψ production relative to continuum events is suppressed for heavy ion induced reactions when E T increases. This suppression is enhanced at low transverse momentum. The π and K meson distributions extracted from the data, have, for each reaction, a similar average transverse momentum which increases only slightly with the transverse energy.
The study of the J ψ transverse momentum distribution in oxygen-uranium reactions at 200 GeV/nucleon shows that 〈 P T 〉 and 〈 P T 2 〉 increase with the transverse energy of the reaction. Muon pairs in the mass continuum do not exhibit the same behaviour. The comparison of the J ψ production rates in central and peripheral collisions shows a significant diminution for low P T central events.
Dimuon production m p-U, O-U and S-U collisions has been studied at 200 GeV/N. It is observed that 〈 p T 〉 and 〈 p 2 T 〉 of the J / Ψ transverse momentum distributions increase with the transverse energy of the ion induced reactions. Such a marked behaviour is not seen for muon pairs of the continuum.
Muon pair production is studied in p - W and S U collisions at 200 GeV per nucleon, as a function of transverse momentum P Tμμ . The inclusive ϱ + ω and Φ differential cross-sections dσ dP T are measured in the dimuon decay channel, for P T ≥ 0.6 GeV/c, in the central rapidity region, 3.0≤ y ≤ 4.0. Assuming the power law A-dependence σ = σ 0 ( A beam · A target ) α , the study of the integrated cross-sections for p - W and S U collisions leads to α ϱ + ω = 1.00±0.02±0.07 and α Φ = 1.23±0.03±0.05, showing clear evidence of Φ enhancement in S U interactions as compared to p - W collisions.
Muon-pair production has been measured in pCu, pU, OCu, OU and SU collisions at 200 GeV per nucleon. The cross sections are compatible with the atomic number dependence ( A proj. A targ. ) α where α =0.91±0.04 for the J/ψ resonance and α =1.01±0.04 for muon pairs produced in the mass continuum between 1.7 and 2.7 GeV/ c 2 .
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psi' production is studied in Pb-Pb collisions at 158 GeV/c per nucleon incident momentum. Absolute cross-sections are measured and production rates are investigated as a function of the centrality of the collision. The results are compared with those obtained for lighter colliding systems and also for the J/psi meson produced under identical conditions.
We report a new measurement of J/psi, psi' and Drell-Yan cross-sections, in the kinematical domain $-0.425<y_{\rm cm}<0.575$ and $-0.5<\cos\theta_{\rm CS}<0.5$, performed at the CERN-SPS using 400 GeV/c incident protons on Be, Al, Cu, Ag, W and Pb targets. The dependence of the charmonia production cross-sections on the size of the target nucleus allows to quantify the so-called normal nuclear absorption. In the framework of the Glauber model, this new measurement is combined with results previously obtained with the same apparatus, under different experimental conditions, and leads to a precise determination of the J/psi and psi' absorption cross-sections in the surrounding nuclear matter.
Cross sections for J ψ,ψ′ and Drell-Yan production in Pb+Pb collisions at 158×A GeV/c are presented and compared with results obtained by the NA38 and NA51 collaborations. The Pb+Pb data have been collected by the NA50 collaboration using the NA38 dimuon spectrometer. The Drell-Yan mechanism is found to scale as (A projectile · B target ) in p+B target and A projectile + B target collisions including Pb+Pb collisions. Regarding J ψ , an anomalous suppression is observed in Pb+Pb collisions with respect to the suppression observed in p+B target , O+B target and S+U collisions. The cross section ratios ψ′ ( J ψ ) are similar in Pb+Pb and S+U collisions.
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