A. Scribano

The pion form factor has been measured in the space-like q2 region 0.014 to 0.26 (GeV/c)2 by scattering 300 GeV pions from the electrons of a liquid hydrogen target. A detailed description is given of the apparatus, data analysis and corrections to the data. The mean square charge radius extracted from the data is model-dependent. We find that a form which includes a realistic description of the form factor phase gives a similar results to the naive pole form, and conclude 〈r2π〉 = 0.438±0.008 fm2.

The TOTEM collaboration has measured the proton-proton total cross section at √s=8 TeV using a luminosity-independent method. In LHC fills with dedicated beam optics, the Roman pots have been inserted very close to the beam allowing the detection of ~90% of the nuclear elastic scattering events. Simultaneously the inelastic scattering rate has been measured by the T1 and T2 telescopes. By applying the optical theorem, the total proton-proton cross section of (101.7±2.9) mb has been determined, well in agreement with the extrapolation from lower energies. This method also allows one to derive the luminosity-independent elastic and inelastic cross sections: σ(el)=(27.1±1.4) mb; σ(inel)=(74.7±1.7) mb.

The TOTEM experiment has made a precise measurement of the elastic proton–proton differential cross-section at the centre-of-mass energy s=8TeV based on a high-statistics data sample obtained with the β⁎=90m optics. Both the statistical and systematic uncertainties remain below 1%, except for the t-independent contribution from the overall normalisation. This unprecedented precision allows to exclude a purely exponential differential cross-section in the range of four-momentum transfer squared 0.027<|t|<0.2GeV2 with a significance greater than 7σ. Two extended parametrisations, with quadratic and cubic polynomials in the exponent, are shown to be well compatible with the data. Using them for the differential cross-section extrapolation to t=0, and further applying the optical theorem, yields total cross-section estimates of (101.5±2.1)mb and (101.9±2.1)mb, respectively, in agreement with previous TOTEM measurements.

The negative kaon electromagnetic form factor has been measured in the space-like q2 range 0.015–0.10 (GeV/c)2 by the direct scattering of 250 GeV kaons from electrons at the CERN SPS. It is found that the kaon mean square charge radius 〈r2K〉 = 0.34 ± 0.05 fm2. From data collected simultaneously for πe scattering, the difference between the charged pion and kaon mean square radii (which is less sensitive to systematic errors) is found to be 〈r2π〉 − 〈r2K = 0.1 0 ± 0.045 fm2.

The CDF central and endwall hadron calorimeter covers the polar region between 30° and 150° and a full 2π in azimuth. It consists of 48 steel-scintillator central modules with 2.5 cm sampling and 48 steel-scintillator endwall modules with 5.0 cm sampling. A general description of the detector is given. Calibration techniques and performance are discussed. Some results of the test beam studies are shown.

The TOTEM Experiment will measure the total pp cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and study elastic and diffractive scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point IP5, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity region 3.1 ⩽ |η| ⩽ 6.5, and Roman Pot stations will be placed at distances of ±147 m and ±220 m from IP5. Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS, TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue its own physics programme and at a later stage together with CMS for a common physics programme. This article gives a description of the TOTEM apparatus and its performance.

We report a measurement of the negative pion electromagnetic form factor in the range of space-like four-momentum transfer 0.014 < q2 < 0.122 (GeV/c)2. The measurement was made by the NA7 collaboration at the CERN SPS, by observing the interaction of 300 GeV pions with the electrons of a liquid hydrogen target. The form factor is fitted by a pole form with a pion radius of 〈r2〈12 = 0.657 ± 0.012 fm.

Proton-proton elastic scattering has been measured by the TOTEM experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider at in dedicated runs with the Roman Pot detectors placed as close as seven times the transverse beam size (σbeam) from the outgoing beams. After careful study of the accelerator optics and the detector alignment, |t|, the square of four-momentum transferred in the elastic scattering process, has been determined with an uncertainty of . In this letter, first results of the differential cross-section are presented covering a |t|-range from 0.36 to 2.5 GeV2. The differential cross-section in the range 0.36 < |t| < 0.47 GeV2 is described by an exponential with a slope parameter B = (23.6 ± 0.5stat ± 0.4syst) GeV−2, followed by a significant diffractive minimum at |t| = (0.53 ± 0.01stat ± 0.01syst) GeV2. For |t|-values larger than ∼1.5 GeV2, the cross-section exhibits a power law behaviour with an exponent of −7.8 ± 0.3stat ± 0.1syst. When compared to predictions based on the different available models, the data show a strong discriminative power despite the small t-range covered.

The TOTEM experiment at the CERN LHC has measured elastic proton–proton scattering at the centre-of-mass energy $$\sqrt{s}=8\,$$ TeV and four-momentum transfers squared, |t|, from $$6\times 10^{-4}$$ to 0.2 GeV $$^{2}$$ . Near the lower end of the t-interval the differential cross-section is sensitive to the interference between the hadronic and the electromagnetic scattering amplitudes. This article presents the elastic cross-section measurement and the constraints it imposes on the functional forms of the modulus and phase of the hadronic elastic amplitude. The data exclude the traditional Simplified West and Yennie interference formula that requires a constant phase and a purely exponential modulus of the hadronic amplitude. For parametrisations of the hadronic modulus with second- or third-order polynomials in the exponent, the data are compatible with hadronic phase functions giving either central or peripheral behaviour in the impact parameter picture of elastic scattering. In both cases, the $$\rho $$ -parameter is found to be $$0.12 \pm 0.03$$ . The results for the total hadronic cross-section are $$\sigma _\mathrm{tot} = (102.9 \pm 2.3)$$ mb and $$(103.0 \pm 2.3)$$ mb for central and peripheral phase formulations, respectively. Both are consistent with previous TOTEM measurements.

The TOTEM collaboration has measured the proton–proton total cross section at $$\sqrt{s}=13~\hbox {TeV}$$ with a luminosity-independent method. Using dedicated $$\beta ^{*}=90~\hbox {m}$$ beam optics, the Roman Pots were inserted very close to the beam. The inelastic scattering rate has been measured by the T1 and T2 telescopes during the same LHC fill. After applying the optical theorem the total proton–proton cross section is $$\sigma _\mathrm{tot}=(110.6~\pm ~3.4$$ ) mb, well in agreement with the extrapolation from lower energies. This method also allows one to derive the luminosity-independent elastic and inelastic cross sections: $$\sigma _\mathrm{el}=(31.0~\pm ~1.7)~\hbox {mb}$$ and $$\sigma _\mathrm{inel}=(79.5~\pm ~1.8)~\hbox {mb}$$ .

Abstract The TOTEM experiment at the LHC has performed the first measurement at $$\sqrt{s} = 13\,\mathrm{TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msqrt><mml:mi>s</mml:mi></mml:msqrt><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>13</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> of the $$\rho $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi></mml:math> parameter, the real to imaginary ratio of the nuclear elastic scattering amplitude at $$t=0$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>t</mml:mi><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>0</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:math> , obtaining the following results: $$\rho = 0.09 \pm 0.01$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.09</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.01</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:math> and $$\rho = 0.10 \pm 0.01$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.10</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.01</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:math> , depending on different physics assumptions and mathematical modelling. The unprecedented precision of the $$\rho $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi></mml:math> measurement, combined with the TOTEM total cross-section measurements in an energy range larger than $$10\,\mathrm{TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mn>10</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> (from 2.76 to $$13\,\mathrm{TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mn>13</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> ), has implied the exclusion of all the models classified and published by COMPETE. The $$\rho $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi></mml:math> results obtained by TOTEM are compatible with the predictions, from other theoretical models both in the Regge-like framework and in the QCD framework, of a crossing-odd colourless 3-gluon compound state exchange in the t -channel of the proton–proton elastic scattering. On the contrary, if shown that the crossing-odd 3-gluon compound state t -channel exchange is not of importance for the description of elastic scattering, the $$\rho $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mi>ρ</mml:mi></mml:math> value determined by TOTEM would represent a first evidence of a slowing down of the total cross-section growth at higher energies. The very low-| t | reach allowed also to determine the absolute normalisation using the Coulomb amplitude for the first time at the LHC and obtain a new total proton–proton cross-section measurement $$\sigma _{\mathrm{tot}} = (110.3 \pm 3.5)\,\mathrm{mb}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msub><mml:mi>σ</mml:mi><mml:mi>tot</mml:mi></mml:msub><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mrow><mml:mo>(</mml:mo><mml:mn>110.3</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>3.5</mml:mn><mml:mo>)</mml:mo></mml:mrow><mml:mspace /><mml:mi>mb</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> , completely independent from the previous TOTEM determination. Combining the two TOTEM results yields $$\sigma _{\mathrm{tot}} = (110.5 \pm 2.4)\,\mathrm{mb}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msub><mml:mi>σ</mml:mi><mml:mi>tot</mml:mi></mml:msub><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mrow><mml:mo>(</mml:mo><mml:mn>110.5</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>2.4</mml:mn><mml:mo>)</mml:mo></mml:mrow><mml:mspace /><mml:mi>mb</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> .

The EM form factor of the pion has been studied in the time-like region by measuring σ(e+e− → π+π−) normalized to σ(e+e− → μ+μ−). Results have been obtained for q2 down to the physical threshold.

We report the first determination of CP violation parameters from parameter from particle—antiparticle asymmetry in the decay of neutral kaons into two charged pions. Observation of such an asymmetry is direct proof of CP violation. A fit to the asymmetry enabled a determination of the parameter η+− to be made, yielding the result |η+−|=[2.32±0.14 (stat.)±0.03 (syst.)]×10−3 and σ+−=42.3°±4.4° (stat.)±0.4° (syst.), with an additional uncertainty of ±1.0° due to the error on the present published value of Δm, the KL0-KS0 mass difference. The magnitudes of both statistical and systematic errors will be significantly reduced in the future.

Previous measurements on K° decay and the interference of KL and KS in the π+π− decay modes have been extended. We find that the interference term has the predicted coefficient with an experimental uncertainty of about 15%, that the KL - KS mass difference is ± (0.445 ± 0.034), the phase ϕ = ϕη - ϕf is ± (1.41 ± 0.18) and we find no evidence for the lepton pair decays of KL. With 90% confidence ΓL.μ+μ−/ΓL < 2 × 10−4 ΓL, e+e−/ΓL < 1.6 × 10−4.

Abstract The proton–proton elastic differential cross section $${\mathrm{d}}\sigma /{\mathrm{d}}t$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>d</mml:mi><mml:mi>σ</mml:mi><mml:mo>/</mml:mo><mml:mi>d</mml:mi><mml:mi>t</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> has been measured by the TOTEM experiment at $$\sqrt{s}=2.76\hbox { TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msqrt><mml:mi>s</mml:mi></mml:msqrt><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>2.76</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mtext>TeV</mml:mtext></mml:mrow></mml:math> energy with $$\beta ^{*}=11\hbox { m}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msup><mml:mi>β</mml:mi><mml:mrow><mml:mrow /><mml:mo>∗</mml:mo></mml:mrow></mml:msup><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>11</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mtext>m</mml:mtext></mml:mrow></mml:math> beam optics. The Roman Pots were inserted to 13 times the transverse beam size from the beam, which allowed to measure the differential cross-section of elastic scattering in a range of the squared four-momentum transfer (| t |) from 0.36 to $$0.74\hbox { GeV}^{2}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mn>0.74</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:msup><mml:mtext>GeV</mml:mtext><mml:mn>2</mml:mn></mml:msup></mml:mrow></mml:math> . The differential cross-section can be described with an exponential in the | t |-range between 0.36 and $$0.54\hbox { GeV}^{2}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mn>0.54</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:msup><mml:mtext>GeV</mml:mtext><mml:mn>2</mml:mn></mml:msup></mml:mrow></mml:math> , followed by a diffractive minimum (dip) at $$|t_{\mathrm{dip}}|=(0.61\pm 0.03)\hbox { GeV}^{2}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mrow><mml:mo>|</mml:mo></mml:mrow><mml:msub><mml:mi>t</mml:mi><mml:mi>dip</mml:mi></mml:msub><mml:mrow><mml:mo>|</mml:mo><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mrow><mml:mo>(</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.61</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.03</mml:mn><mml:mo>)</mml:mo></mml:mrow><mml:mspace /></mml:mrow><mml:msup><mml:mtext>GeV</mml:mtext><mml:mn>2</mml:mn></mml:msup></mml:mrow></mml:math> and a subsequent maximum (bump). The ratio of the $${\mathrm{d}}\sigma /{\mathrm{d}}t$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>d</mml:mi><mml:mi>σ</mml:mi><mml:mo>/</mml:mo><mml:mi>d</mml:mi><mml:mi>t</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math> at the bump and at the dip is $$1.7\pm 0.2$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mn>1.7</mml:mn><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>0.2</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:math> . When compared to the proton–antiproton measurement of the D0 experiment at $$\sqrt{s} = 1.96\hbox { TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msqrt><mml:mi>s</mml:mi></mml:msqrt><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>1.96</mml:mn><mml:mspace /><mml:mtext>TeV</mml:mtext></mml:mrow></mml:math> , a significant difference can be observed. Under the condition that the effects due to the energy difference between TOTEM and D0 can be neglected, the result provides evidence for the exchange of a colourless C-odd three-gluon compound state in the t -channel of the proton–proton and proton–antiproton elastic scattering.

We describe the design and construction of a large drift chamber of a novel design well adapted for operation in high magnetic fields and in the high track density environment of hadron colliders.

The first double diffractive cross-section measurement in the very forward region has been carried out by the TOTEM experiment at the LHC with center-of-mass energy of sqrt(s)=7 TeV. By utilizing the very forward TOTEM tracking detectors T1 and T2, which extend up to |eta|=6.5, a clean sample of double diffractive pp events was extracted. From these events, we measured the cross-section sigma_DD =(116 +- 25) mub for events where both diffractive systems have 4.7 <|eta|_min < 6.5 .

Measurements were made of the cross section of the reactions π−p → ν′(958)n, η′ → 2γ at momenta at 15, 20, 25, 30 and 40 GeV/c. The experiment was carried out on the IHEP 70 GeV accelerator using the 648 channel hodoscope spectrometer NICE for γ-ray detection. A total of 6000 η′ mesons were recorded. A sharp drop is seen in the differential cross section for t → 0. The dependences of the differential cross sections for the π−p → η′n and π−p → η n on t are identical. On the basis of the ratio of the cross sections for these reactions at t = 0, i.e. R(η′n)t=0 = 0.55 ± 0.06, the singlet-octet mixing angle for pseudoscalar mesons was determined to be β = −(18.2 ± 1.4)°.

The TOTEM experiment at LHC has chosen the triple Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) technology for its T2 telescope which will provide charged track reconstruction in the pseudorapidity range 5.3<|η|<6.5 and a fully inclusive trigger for inelastic events. GEMs are gas filled detectors which combine good spatial resolution with very high rate capability and a good resistance to radiation. Preliminary results of cosmic ray tests performed at CERN on final T2 modules before installation are here presented. Comparisons between real and simulated detector performance are also shown.

The TOTEM experiment has measured the charged-particle pseudorapidity density dNch/dη in pp collisions at for 5.3<|η|<6.4 in events with at least one charged particle with transverse momentum above 40 MeV/c in this pseudorapidity range. This extends the analogous measurement performed by the other LHC experiments to the previously unexplored forward η region. The measurement refers to more than 99% of non-diffractive processes and to single and double diffractive processes with diffractive masses above ∼3.4 GeV/c2, corresponding to about 95% of the total inelastic cross-section. The dNch/dη has been found to decrease with |η|, from 3.84 ± 0.01(stat) ± 0.37(syst) at |η|=5.375 to 2.38±0.01(stat)±0.21(syst) at |η|=6.375. Several MC generators have been compared to data; none of them has been found to fully describe the measurement.

Charmed meson pairs have been photoproduced coherently on an active silicon target. Ninety-eight decays have been analyzed and the lifetime of charged D's has been measured.

The invariant mass spectrum of neutral meson states from π−p interactions at 40 GeV/c incident momentum has been investigated in a high statistics experiment performed at the 70 GeV IHEP accelerator. To detect the high energy photons coming from the produced neutral states, a hodoscope spectrometer with a computer on-line was used. A clear structure on the mass spectrum of dipions produced in the reaction π−p→π°π°n is observed at 2 GeV. The decay angular distributions show in this mass region the variation with mass typical of a state with a spin J = 4. The mass of the observed meson is found to be M = (2020±30)MeV and the estimate of the full width is (180±60) MeV.

The muon telescopes of the Extreme Energy Events (EEE) experiment are based on Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC). The EEE network is composed, so far, of 53 telescopes, each made of three MRPC detectors; it is organized in clusters and single telescope stations distributed all over the Italian territory and installed in High Schools, covering an area larger than 3×105 km2. The study of Extensive Air Showers (EAS), that is one of the goal of the project, requires excellent performance in terms of time and spatial resolution, efficiency, tracking capability and long term stability. The data from two recent coordinated data taking periods, named Run 2 and Run 3, have been used to measure these quantities and the results are here reported, together with a comparison with expectations and with the results from a beam test performed in 2006 at CERN.

New scintillation counters have been designed and constructed for the CDF upgrade in order to complete the muon coverage of the central CDF detector, and to extend this coverage to larger pseudorapidity. A novel light collection technique using wavelength shifting fibers, together with high quality polystyrene-based scintillator resulted in compact counters with good and stable light collection efficiency over lengths extending up to 320 cm. Their design and construction is described and results of their initial performance are reported.

Proton-proton elastic scattering has been measured by the TOTEM experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider at √s = 7 TeV in special runs with the Roman Pot detectors placed as close to the outgoing beam as seven times the transverse beam size. The differential cross-section measurements are reported in the |t|-range of 0.36 to 2.5 GeV2. Extending the range of data to low t values from 0.02 to 0.33 GeV2, and utilizing the luminosity measurements of CMS, the total proton-proton cross section at √s = 7 TeV is measured to be (98.3 ±0.2stat ±2.8syst) mb.

The TOTEM Experiment is designed to measure the total proton-proton cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and to study elastic and diffractive pp scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point IP5, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, are installed on each side of the IP in the pseudorapidity region 3.1 < = |eta | < = 6.5, and special movable beam-pipe insertions - called Roman Pots (RP) - are placed at distances of +- 147 m and +- 220 m from IP5. This article describes in detail the working of the TOTEM detector to produce physics results in the first three years of operation and data taking at the LHC.

This paper describes the design and the performance of the timing detector developed by the TOTEM Collaboration for the Roman Pots (RPs) to measure the Time-Of-Flight (TOF) of the protons produced in central diffractive interactions at the LHC . The measurement of the TOF of the protons allows the determination of the longitudinal position of the proton interaction vertex and its association with one of the vertices reconstructed by the CMS detectors. The TOF detector is based on single crystal Chemical Vapor Deposition (scCVD) diamond plates and is designed to measure the protons TOF with about 50 ps time precision. This upgrade to the TOTEM apparatus will be used in the LHC run 2 and will tag the central diffractive events up to an interaction pileup of about 1. A dedicated fast and low noise electronics for the signal amplification has been developed. The digitization of the diamond signal is performed by sampling the waveform. After introducing the physics studies that will most profit from the addition of these new detectors, we discuss in detail the optimization and the performance of the first TOF detector installed in the LHC in November 2015.

The ϱ− radiative decay width has been measured by studying the production of ϱ− via the Primakoff effect by 200 GeV incident π− on Cu and Pb targets. This width was obtained by fitting the measured dσ/dt for ϱ production with the theoretical coherent differential cross section including both the electromagnetic and strong contributions. The measured radiative width value is 81 ± 4 ± 4 keV: it is consistent with the ratio Γ(ϱ → πγ)/Γ(ω → πγ) ∼ case:19 as expected from the vector dominance and the quark model.

The reaction π−p→π0ηn↳2y↳2y has been analyzed using data of an experimental performed at the 70 GeV accelerator, with the NICE 648 channel hodoscope spectrometer for γ ray detection. Events with 4γ seen are used for the analysis. A method is applied, which allows the determination of the number of π0η events for each mass, cosθGJ and t bin. Mass spectra, t distributions and decay angular distributions for the π0η system are presented. The cross section for the production of A20 is found to be 2.7 ± 1.1 μb at 40 GeV/c beam momentum. No indication of a resonant 1− state in the π0η system is observed, in spite of the fact that this state is allowed for the π0η system on the same footing as the observed 0+ and 2+ resonances.

A detector has been developed in our laboratory for proposed use in high energy experiments. It works as a MWPC in which the ionizing medium consists of a thin layer of silicon crystal. The results of the test carried out at CERN show that the detector is ideally suited for the detection of minimum ionizing particles and can provide very high spatial resolution.

The pseudorapidity density of charged particles dN $$_{ ch }$$ /d $$\eta $$ is measured by the TOTEM experiment in proton–proton collisions at $$\sqrt{s} = 8$$ TeV within the range $$3.9<\eta <4.7$$ and $$-6.95<\eta <-6.9$$ . Data were collected in a low intensity LHC run with collisions occurring at a distance of 11.25 m from the nominal interaction point. The data sample is expected to include 96–97 % of the inelastic proton–proton interactions. The measurement reported here considers charged particles with $$p_T>0$$ MeV/c, produced in inelastic interactions with at least one charged particle in $$-7<\eta <-6$$ or $$3.7<\eta <4.8$$ . The dN $$_{ ch }$$ /d $$\eta $$ has been found to decrease with $$|\eta |$$ , from 5.11 $$\pm $$ 0.73 at $$\eta =3.95$$ to 1.81 $$\pm $$ 0.56 at $$\eta =-$$ 6.925. Several Monte Carlo generators are compared to the data and are found to be within the systematic uncertainty of the measurement.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) experiment, a joint project of the Centro Fermi and INFN Italian national research institutes, has a dual purpose: a scientific research program for measurements of the cosmic rays flux at ground level and an intense outreach and educational program with an active contribution of students and teachers in the construction and operation of the detectors in High Schools. The network counts 60 tracking detectors, each made by three Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC), operated so far with a gas mixture composed by 98% C2H2F4 and 2% SF6. Given its high Global Warming Potential (GWP), the collaboration, since few years, started a R&D on alternative mixtures environmentally sustainable. Latest results on a C3H2F4 + He eco-friendly mixture are here presented.

Abstract The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Collaboration is fully involved in an ecological transition. The use of the standard gas mixture, C 2 H 2 F 4 + SF 6 , has stopped in favor of an alternative green mixture based on C 3 H 2 F 4 with the addition of He or CO 2 . The choise of these new mixtures is motivated by the significant lower Global Warming Potential (GWP) to reduce the emission of gases potentially contributing to the greenhouse effect. The EEE experiment consists of 61 muon telescopes based on Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs), each telescope composed of 3 chambers filled with gas. Several EEE detectors are today completely fluxed with the new ecological mixture. This contribution will report recent results about the telescope performance obtained from studies with the eco-friendly alternative mixture carried out in the last years.

A high-statistics measurement of the reaction π−p→ηn; η→2γ has been performed at the 70 GeV Serpukhov accelerator for 15, 20, 25, 30 and 40 GeV/c incident pion momentum using the NICE set-up with its associated 648-channel hodoscope spectrometer for γ-ray detection. It is found that the spin-flip and non-spin-flip amplitudes can be parametrized, for small |t|, as exponentials with the same slopes to within a few percent. For |t| ≳ 1 (GeV/c)2 there is a break in the differential cross section. In addition, the A2 effective trajectory deviates markedly for |t| ≳ 1 GeV/c)2 from the linear behaviour valid for smaller |t|.

A high statistics measurement of the reaction π−p → π0n has been performed at the Serpukhov accelerator for 15, 20, 25, 30 and 40 GeV/c incident pion momentum using the NICE set-up with its associated 648-channel hodoscope spectrometer for γ-ray detection. More than 3 million charge-exchange events have been recorded in total. It is found that the spin-flip and non-spin-flip amplitudes can be parametrized, for small |t|, as exponentials with the same slopes to within a few percent. Also the behaviour of the differential cross section for small and medium |t| agrees with the prediction of a geometrical s-channel model which describes binary reactions in terms of a complex pole b0(s). The imaginary part of this universal pole, Im b0(s), has been determined and found to be growing logarithmically with s.

The invariant mass spectrum of neutral final states produced in π−p charge-exchange scattering at 40 GeV/c has been studied, searching for heavy particles decaying in 2γ. A peak is observed around 2.85 GeV/c2. The cross section of the reaction π−p→X(2.85)+n, times the branching ratio of the X→2γ decay, is measured to be σ × BR ⋍ 2 × 10−34cm2.

We compare published ππ-phase shifts with results from an analysis of the reaction π−p→πoπon. The ‘up’-solution as well as the ‘in-between’ -solution for the I = 0 s-wave ππ-scattering are ruled out. The only set of s-wave phase shifts consistent with our data is the ‘up-down’-solution with a rapid rise of σ00 near the KK̄-threshold.

Precise knowledge of the beam optics at the LHC is crucial to fulfil the physics goals of the TOTEM experiment, where the kinematics of the scattered protons is reconstructed with the near-beam telescopes -- so-called Roman Pots (RP). Before being detected, the protons' trajectories are influenced by the magnetic fields of the accelerator lattice. Thus precise understanding of the proton transport is of key importance for the experiment. A novel method of optics evaluation is proposed which exploits kinematical distributions of elastically scattered protons observed in the RPs. Theoretical predictions, as well as Monte Carlo studies, show that the residual uncertainty of this optics estimation method is smaller than 0.25 percent.

In this paper the first study of the upward going events detected by the telescopes of the Extreme Energy Event (EEE) project is reported. The EEE project consists of a detector array of Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers located at selected sites on the Italian territory. During autumn 2014 the first coordinated data taking period took place and around one billion candidate tracks were collected. Among them, of particular interest is the sample of particles which cross the telescopes from below. The results obtained demonstrate that the EEE telescopes can distinguish the electrons produced as decay products of cosmic muons stopped in the ground, or in the last chamber of the telescopes themselves, confirming the excellent performance of the system for the investigation of intriguing cosmic phenomena.

Abstract The TOTEM collaboration at the CERN LHC has measured the differential cross-section of elastic proton–proton scattering at $$\sqrt{s} = 8\,\mathrm{TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msqrt> <mml:mi>s</mml:mi> </mml:msqrt> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mn>8</mml:mn> <mml:mspace /> <mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> in the squared four-momentum transfer range $$0.2\,\mathrm{GeV^{2}}&lt; |t| &lt; 1.9\,\mathrm{GeV^{2}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>0.2</mml:mn> <mml:mspace /> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> <mml:mo>&lt;</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mo>&lt;</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1.9</mml:mn> <mml:mspace /> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> . This interval includes the structure with a diffractive minimum (“dip”) and a secondary maximum (“bump”) that has also been observed at all other LHC energies, where measurements were made. A detailed characterisation of this structure for $$\sqrt{s} = 8\,\mathrm{TeV}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msqrt> <mml:mi>s</mml:mi> </mml:msqrt> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mn>8</mml:mn> <mml:mspace /> <mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> yields the positions, $$|t|_{\mathrm{dip}} = (0.521 \pm 0.007)\,\mathrm{GeV^2}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mi>dip</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>(</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.521</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.007</mml:mn> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mspace /> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> and $$|t|_{\mathrm{bump}} = (0.695 \pm 0.026)\,\mathrm{GeV^2}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>|</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mi>bump</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>(</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.695</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.026</mml:mn> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mspace /> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> , as well as the cross-section values, $$\left. {\mathrm{d}\sigma /\mathrm{d}t}\right| _{\mathrm{dip}} = (15.1 \pm 2.5)\,\mathrm{{\mu b/GeV^2}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mfenced> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>d</mml:mi> <mml:mi>σ</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:mi>d</mml:mi> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:mfenced> <mml:mi>dip</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>(</mml:mo> <mml:mn>15.1</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>2.5</mml:mn> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mspace /> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>b</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> and $$\left. {\mathrm{d}\sigma /\mathrm{d}t}\right| _{\mathrm{bump}} = (29.7 \pm 1.8)\,\mathrm{{\mu b/GeV^2}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mfenced> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>d</mml:mi> <mml:mi>σ</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:mi>d</mml:mi> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:mfenced> <mml:mi>bump</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>(</mml:mo> <mml:mn>29.7</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1.8</mml:mn> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mspace /> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>b</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>GeV</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> , for the dip and the bump, respectively.

Abstract The TOTEM experiment, small in size compared to the others at the LHC, is dedicated to the measurement of the total proton–proton cross-sections with a luminosity-independent method and to the study of elastic and diffractive scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the IP5 interaction point, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudo-rapidity region between 3.1 and 6.5, and Roman Pot stations will be placed at distances of 147 and 220 m from IP5. The telescope closest to the interaction point (T1, centred at z=9 m) consists of Cathode Strip Chambers (CSC), while the second one (T2, centred at 13.5 m), makes use of Gas Electron Multipliers (GEM). The proton detectors in the Roman Pots are silicon devices designed by TOTEM with the specific objective of reducing down to a few tens of microns the insensitive area at the edge. High efficiency as close as possible to the physical detector boundary is an essential feature. It maximizes the experimental acceptance for protons scattered elastically or interactively at polar angles down to a few micro-radians at IP5. To measure protons at the lowest possible emission angles, special beam optics have been conceived to optimize proton detection in terms of acceptance and resolution. The read-out of all TOTEM subsystems is based on the custom-developed digital VFAT chip with trigger capability.

A telescope made up of thin silicon detectors was built and used as a live target in a high-energy photoproduction experiment at the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron. Its working principles, construction technique, and the results of tests are reported. This telescope will allow measurement of the decay path in the range 300–10000 μm.

The Extreme Energy Events Project has been designed to join the scientific interest of a cosmic rays physics experiment with the enormous didactic potentiality deriving from letting it be carried out by high school students and teachers. After the initial phase, the experiment is starting to take data continuously, and the first interesting physics results have been obtained, demonstrating the validity of the idea of running a real physics investigation in these peculiar conditions. Here an overview of its structure and status is presented, together with some studies about detector performance and first physics results.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project is devoted to the study of Extensive Atmospheric Showers through a network of muon telescopes, installed in High Schools, with the further aim of introducing young students to particle and astroparticle physics. Each telescope is a tracking detector composed of three Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC) with an active area of 1.60 × 0.80 m2. Their characteristics are similar to the ones built for the Time Of Flight array of the ALICE Experimentat LHC . The EEE Project started with a few pilot towns, where the telescopes have been taking data since 2008, and it has been constantly extended, reaching at present more than 50 MRPCs telescopes. They are spread across Italy with two additional stations at CERN, covering an area of around 3 × 105 km2, with a total surface area for all the MRPCs of 190 m2. A comprehensive description of the MRPCs network is reported here: efficiency, time and spatial resolution measured using cosmic rays hitting the telescopes. The most recent results on the detector and physics performance from a series of coordinated data acquisition periods are also presented.

Abstract The eruption of the Hunga-Tonga volcano in the South Pacific Ocean on January 15, 2022, at about 4:15 UTC, generated a violent explosion, which created atmospheric pressure disturbances in the form of Rayleigh-Lamb waves detected all over the globe. Here we discuss the observation of the Hunga-Tonga shock-wave performed at the Ny-Ålesund Research Station on the Spitsbergen island, by the detectors of the PolarquEEEst experiment and their ancillary sensors. Online pressure data as well as the results of dedicated offline analysis are presented and discussed in details. Results include wave arrival times, wave amplitude measurements and wave velocity calculation. We observed five passages of the shock wave with a significance larger than 3 $$\sigma$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> and an amplitude up to 1 hPa. The average propagation velocity resulted to be (308 ± 0.6) m/s. Possible effects of the atmospheric pressure variation associated with the shock-wave multiple passages on the cosmic-ray rate at ground level are also investigated. We did not find any significant evidence of this effect.

The need for reducing the emission of gases, potentially contributing to the greenhouse effect and climate change, has impacted many fields, including scientific research. The Extreme Energy Event (EEE) collaboration started, already several years ago, a series of tests aiming at finding a more eco-friendly replacement for the gases used in the Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs) of its network. These tests identified a promising binary gas mixture, and data taking has begun with a subset of the telescopes of the EEE network, making EEE the first experiment in the world completely implemented with MRPCs and operating with an eco-friendly gas mixture. Here the results of the tests and a preliminary comparison of the telescope performance measured with the standard (non eco-friendly) and the new eco-friendly gas mixtures are presented and discussed.

The Schwarzschild–Couder Telescope (SCT) is a dual mirror medium-sized telescope proposed for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA), the next-generation very-high energy (from about 20 GeV to 300 TeV) gamma-ray observatory. The SCT design consists of a dual-mirror optics and a high resolution camera with a field of view (FoV) of 8 degrees squared, which will allow exceptional performance in terms of angular resolution and background rejection. A prototype telescope (named pSCT) has been installed at the Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory in Arizona, USA. Its camera is partially equipped and covers a FoV of 2.7°. The pSCT has recently successfully detected the Crab Nebula with a statistical significance of 8.6 standard deviations. The upgrade of the pSCT focal plane is now ongoing, aimed to equip the full camera with upgraded sensors and electronics, enhancing the telescope field of view from the current 2.7°to the final 8°. In this presentation, an overview of the pSCT project and obtained results will be given, together with the camera upgrade status and expected performance.

The NAl (FRAMM) experiment, under construction for the CERN-SPS North Area, deals with more than 1000 counter signals which have to be combined together in order to build sophisticated and highly selective triggers. These requirements have led to the development of a low cost, combinatorial, fast electronics which can replace, in an advantageous way, the standard NIM electronics at the trigger level. The essential performances of the basic circuit are: 1) programmability of any desired logical expression; 2) trigger time independent of the chosen expression; 3) reduced cost and compactness due to the use of commercial RAMs, PROMs, and PLAs; 4) short delay, less than 20 ns, between input and output pulses.

We report on a measurement for the branching-ratio X0 → 2γX0 ar all. Our result is X0 → 2γX0 → all = (2.9 ± 0.9)%.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project is a Centro Fermi - CERN - INFN - MIUR Collaboration Project for the study of extremely high energy cosmic rays, which exploits the Multigap Resistive Plate Chamber (MRPC) technology. The excellent time resolution and good tracking capability of this kind of detector allows us to study Extensive Air Showers (EAS) with an array of MRPC telescopes distributed across the Italian territory. Each telescope is installed in a high school, with the further goal to introduce students to particle and astroparticle Physics. The status of the experiment and the results obtained are reported.

The Extreme Energy Events project (EEE) is aimed to study Extensive Air Showers (EAS) from primary cosmic rays of more than 1018 eV energy detecting the ground secondary muon component using an array of telescopes with high spatial and time resolution. The second goal of the EEE project is to involve High School teachers and students in this advanced research work and to initiate them in scientific culture: to reach both purposes the telescopes are located inside High School buildings and the detector construction, assembling and monitoring - together with data taking and analysis - are done by researchers from scientific institutions in close collaboration with them. At present there are 42 telescopes in just as many High Schools scattered all over Italy, islands included, plus two at CERN and three in INFN units. We report here some preliminary physics results from the first two common data taking periods together with the outreach impact of the project.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project is meant to be the most extensive experiment to detect secondary cosmic particles in Italy. To this aim, more than 50 telescopes have been built at CERN and installed in high schools distributed all over the Italian territory. Each EEE telescope comprises three large area Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs) and is capable of reconstructing the trajectories of the charged particles traversing it with a good angular resolution. The excellent performance of the EEE telescopes allows a large variety of studies, from measuring the local muon flux in a single telescope, to detecting extensive air showers producing time correlations in the same metropolitan area, to searching for large-scale correlations between showers detected in telescopes tens, hundreds or thousands of kilometers apart. In addition to its scientific goal, the EEE Project also has an educational and outreach objective, its aim being to motivate young people by involving them directly in a real experiment. High school students and teachers are involved in the construction, testing and start-up of the EEE telescope in their school, then in its maintenance and data-acquisition, and later in the analysis of the data. During the last couple of years a great boost has been given to the EEE Project through the organization of simultaneous and centralized data taking with the whole telescope array. The raw data from all telescopes are transferred to CNAF (Bologna), where they are reconstructed and stored. The data are currently being analyzed, looking at various topics: variation of the rate of cosmic muons with time, upward going muons, muon lifetime, search for anisotropies in the muon angular distribution and for time coincidences between stations. In this paper an overall description of the experiment is given, including the design, construction and performance of the telescopes. The operation of the whole array is also presented by showing the most recent physics results.

The first observation of neutral pion production in πe inelastic scattering is presented. The cross section at 300 GeV for |t‖>62;10−3 (GeV / c)2 is 2.11 ± 0.47 nb, in good agreement with the theory of PCAC anomalies with 3 quark colours.

The EEE (Extreme Energy Events) Project is an experiment for the detection of cosmic ray muons by means of a sparse array of telescopes, each made of three Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC), distributed over all the Italian territory and at CERN. The main scientific goals of the Project are the investigation of the properties of the local muon flux, the detection of Extensive Air Showers (EAS) and the search for long-distance correlations between far telescopes. The Project is also characterized by a strong educational and outreach aspect since the telescopes are managed by teams of students and teachers who had previously constructed them at CERN. In this paper an overall description of the experiment is given, including the design, construction and performance of the telescopes. The operation of the whole array, which currently consists of more than 50 telescopes, is also presented by showing the most recent physics results.

The TOTEM collaboration has measured the proton-proton total cross section at $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV with a luminosity-independent method. Using dedicated $β^{*}=90$ m beam optics, the Roman Pots were inserted very close to the beam. The inelastic scattering rate has been measured by the T1 and T2 telescopes during the same LHC fill. After applying the optical theorem the total proton-proton cross section is $σ_{\rm tot}=(110.6 \pm 3.4$) mb, well in agreement with the extrapolation from lower energies. This method also allows one to derive the luminosity-independent elastic and inelastic cross sections: $σ_{\rm el} = (31.0 \pm 1.7)$ mb and $σ_{\rm inel} = (79.5 \pm 1.8)$ mb.

This paper discusses the possibility to employ the Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC) of the Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project as muon tracking detectors to monitor the long term stability of civil buildings and structures when used in conjunction with additional detectors, to reconstruct the average direction of the cosmic muon tracks passing through both devices and any small variation over long time acquisition periods. The performance of such setup is discussed and preliminary experimental coincidence results obtained with a 40× 60 cm 2 scintillator detector operated in the same building with one of the EEE telescopes, at about 15 m vertical distance from it, are presented. Simple Monte Carlo and GEANT simulations were also carried out to evaluate typical acceptance values for the operating conditions employed so far, to extrapolate to other geometrical configurations, and to evaluate multiple scattering effects.

Resolution and linearity of the position measurement of Pisa multi-electrode silicon detectors are presented. The detectors are operated in slightly underdepleted mode and take advantage of their intrinsic resistivity for resistive charge partition between adjacent strips. 22 μm resolution is achieved with readout lines spaced 300 μm. Possible applications in colliding beam experiments for the detection of secondary vertices are discussed.

The ratio between the cross sections for the reactions π− p→ χ↳2γ0 n and π−p → η→2γ n has been measured to be (2.4 ± 0.9) × 10−2, (2.1 ± 0.6) × 10−2 and (2.8 ± 1.3) × 10−2 at 3.8,6,8 and 12 GeV/c incident momentum respectively. At the same momenta the cross section for πt- p → neutrals is (1.48 ± 0.09) mb, (0.86 ± 0.05) mb, (0.64 ± 0.04) mb and (0.42±0.03) mb.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project employs Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs) for studying the secondary cosmic ray muons in Extensive Air Showers. The array consists of about 60 tracking detectors, sparse on Italian territory and at CERN. The MRPCs are flowed with a gas mixture based on C2H2F4 and SF6, both of which are fluorinated greenhouse gases with a high environmental impact on the atmosphere. Due to the restrictions imposed by the European Union, these gases are being phased out of production and their cost is largely increasing. The EEE Collaboration started a campaign to reduce the gas emission from its array with the aim of containing costs and decreasing the experiment global warming impact. One method is to reduce the gas rate in each EEE detector. Another is to develop a gas recirculation system, whose prototype has been installed at one of the EEE stations located at CERN. Jointly a parallel strategy is focused on searching for environmental friendly gas mixtures which are able to substitute the standard mixture without affecting the MRPC performance. An overview and the first results are presented here.

Describes the germanium monlithic detector and discusses its performance. The detector is a parallelepiped 5 x 5 x 20 mm in volume with 48 electrodes 20 mm long, 50 microns wide and spaced 50 microns one from the other deposited on one face. Presents a sketch of the detector and its working principle. To obtain a finer granularity, a telescope of 40 layers of silica was substituted with a target made out of a single block of germanium followed by a silicon telescope.

An experiment to study high energy γ rays from localized cosmic sources is described. A number of Al mirrors reflects the Cherenkov light emitted by the showers into photosensitive gas chambers on the mirror focal plane. The use of gas chambers with large active areas allows a sensitivity superior to existing experiments to be reached. Pad readout gives the required angular accuracy. The chamber is sensitive to the middle ultraviolet Cherenkov light produced by the showers in the atmosphere. Since the ozone in the upper atmosphere absorbs the direct ultraviolet light from any outer source, the lower level atmosphere provides a large dark volume in which the Cherenkov radiation from the showers can be isolated.

A new GeSi active target is presently used in the NA1 experiment at CERN to study photoproduction of charmed particles and to measure their lifetimes. Some general comments on the active target technique are made.

The reaction π−p→π0π0n has been measured with a 648 channel hodoscope spectrometer for the detection of the four γ's from the π0 decays. The π0π0 D-wave is fully compatible with the f0 contribution as it is determined in high-statistics π+π− experiments. The magnitude of the π0π0 S-wave and the cosinus of its phase angle (relative to the known D-wave) are determined from fits to the π0π0 angular distributions. Argand diagrams for the I = 0 amplitude S0 are given for the range 1000 to 1500 MeV/c2. Two solutions exist. One exceeds the unitarity limit above 1200 MeV/c2. The other remains within the unitarity limit and is nearly elastic up to 1450 MeV/c2. It indicates an S0 wave resonance around 1300 MeV/c2.

New results on a high statistics measurement of pion-nucleon charge exchange scattering at 40 GeV/c, extending in momentum transfer up to −t = 1.8 (GeV/c)2, are reported and compared with an optical impact parameter model, together with previous data for the reaction π−p → ηn at the same energy. The imaginary part of the pole trajectory b0(s) is determined from the slope of the tangent to the maxima of (−t)12dσdt. The linear increase of Im b0(s) with log s, which has been observed at low energies, continues up to 40 GeV/c.

We have searched for decays in a sample of 1252 π− p →3γ +n events with the 3γ invariant mass in the ω-region. Practically all events fit and we find .

The Extreme Energy Events Project is an experiment devoted to the study of the Extensive Atmospheric Showers (EAS) which consists of a network of Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs) muon telescopes distributed over a very large area ∼3times105km2. It requires a precise time synchronization to correlate the information collected from each single detector. The data acquisition system of each telescope is equipped with a trigger unit and a GPS receiver to perform precision timing of events. The Global Positioning System (GPS) unit provides the one pulse per second signal (1PPS) which is used to create a timestamp in UTC time. A novel VME trigger unit for the EEE telescopes was developed, including an embedded GPS engine for timing application. The trigger/GPS unit is presented, including some preliminary measurements of its time resolution.

The TOTEM experiment at the LHC has performed the first measurement at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV of the $\rho$ parameter, the real to imaginary ratio of the nuclear elastic scattering amplitude at $t=0$, obtaining the following results: $\rho = 0.09 \pm 0.01$ and $\rho = 0.10 \pm 0.01$, depending on different physics assumptions and mathematical modelling. The unprecedented precision of the $\rho$ measurement, combined with the TOTEM total cross-section measurements in an energy range larger than 10 TeV (from 2.76 to 13 TeV), has implied the exclusion of all the models classified and published by COMPETE. The $\rho$ results obtained by TOTEM are compatible with the predictions, from alternative theoretical models both in the Regge-like framework and in the QCD framework, of a colourless 3-gluon bound state exchange in the $t$-channel of the proton-proton elastic scattering. On the contrary, if shown that the 3-gluon bound state $t$-channel exchange is not of importance for the description of elastic scattering, the $\rho$ value determined by TOTEM would represent a first evidence of a slowing down of the total cross-section growth at higher energies. The very low-$|t|$ reach allowed also to determine the absolute normalisation using the Coulomb amplitude for the first time at the LHC and obtain a new total proton-proton cross-section measurement $\sigma_{tot} = 110.3 \pm 3.5$ mb, completely independent from the previous TOTEM determination. Combining the two TOTEM results yields $\sigma_{tot} = 110.5 \pm 2.4$ mb.

A measurement of the lifetime of theΛ c baryon photoproduced coherently off a Germanium-Silicon target is presented. A signal ofΛ c →ΔK*→pKππ0 has been observed and the two different decay diagrams for this process are compared. A sample of 9Λ c decays gives a lifetime of 1.1 −0.4 +0.8 10−13 s.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) experiment is the largest system in the world completely implemented with Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs). Presently, it consists of a network of 59 muon telescopes, each made of 3 MRPCs, devoted to the study of secondary cosmic rays. Its stations, sometimes hundreds of kilometers apart, are synchronized at a few nanoseconds level via a clock signal delivered by the Global Positioning System. The data collected during centrally coordinated runs are sent to INFN CNAF, the largest center for scientific computing in Italy, where they are reconstructed and made available for analysis. Thanks to the on-line monitoring and data transmission, EEE operates as a single coordinated system spread over an area of about 3 × 105 km2. In 2017, the EEE collaboration started an important upgrade program, aiming to extend the network with 20 additional stations, with the option to have more in the future. This implies the construction, testing and commissioning of 60 chambers, for a total detector surface of around 80 m2. In this paper, aspects related to this challenging endeavor are covered, starting from the technological solutions chosen to build these state-of-the-art detectors, to the quality controls and the performance tests carried on.

The Extreme Energy Events observatory is an extended muon telescope array, covering more than 10 degrees both in latitude and longitude. Its 59 muon telescopes are equipped with tracking detectors based on Multigap Resistive Plate Chamber technology with time resolution of the order of a few hundred picoseconds. The recent restrictions on greenhouse gases demand studies for new gas mixtures in compliance with the relative requirements. Tetrafluoropropene is one of the candidates for tetrafluoroethane substitution, since it is characterized by a Global Warming Power around 300 times lower than the gas mixtures used up to now. Several mixtures have been tested, measuring efficiency curves, charge distributions, streamer fractions and time resolutions. Results are presented for the whole set of mixtures and operating conditions, %. A set of tests on a real EEE telescope, with cosmic muons, are being performed at the CERN-01 EEE telescope. The tests are focusing on identifying a mixture with good performance at the low rates typical of an EEE telescope.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project is a Centro Fermi - CERN - INFN - MIUR Collaboration Project, for the study of extremely high-energy cosmic rays, which exploits the Multigap Resistive Plate Chamber (MRPC) technology. The excellent time resolution and good tracking capability of this detector allows us to study Extensive Air Showers (EAS) with an array of telescopes distributed all over the Italian territory. Each telescope is installed in a High School, with the additional goal to introduce students to particle and astroparticle Physics. The EEE array is composed, so far, of 47 telescopes, each made of three MRPC planes, spanning more than 10 degrees in latitude and 11 in longitude, organized in clusters and single telescope stations. The status of the experiment and the results, obtained during two recent coordinated data taking periods, will be reported. The observation of Forbush decreases, coincidence events among different telescopes and the muon decay, using more than 5 billion tracks collected in the last few months, are of particular interest.

A liquid H2 target with good collection of the Čerenkov light emitted by high energy pions has been recently tested at the CERN PS. When the incoming π− makes an interaction with a completely neutral final state, the amount of light emitted depends on the length of the pion path from the entrance window to the interaction point. Therefore a measurement of the light gives information on the location of the interaction along the target. The resolution obtained with a 20 cm long target is about 3 cm fwhm.

The CLUE experiment uses a new cosmic ray detector array planned to operate for the next decade. It utilises a MWPC chambers sensitive to UV, to image Cherenkov radiation produced in cosmic ray showers. This approach is unique in that the instrument is insensitive to skylight backgrounds, has a threshold similar to that of visible Cherenkov experiments but a longer duty cycle. These features make possible a class of interesting cosmic ray physics experiments. The CLUE experiment has started operation with two of the ten telescopes that are foreseen for its beginning. These telescopes are at present at Roque de Los Muchachos in the Canary Islands, in the same site as the HEGRA experiment. A description of the telescopes is given and some data on the tests performed are presented.

The CLUE experiment, located in La Palma island at 2200 m a.s.l., is an array of 3×3 telescope, detecting the UV (190 – 230 nm) Čerenkov light produced by atmospheric showers. Since atmospheric absorption in the UV range is higher than in the visible range, CLUE cannot apply existing algorithms normally used in IACT experiments to determine primary cosmic ray direction. In this paper we present a new method developed by CLUE. The algorithm performances were evaluated using simulated showers. Using the new technique, preliminary results of last two years observational campaigns on the Crab Nebula and on Markarian 421 are presented, showing a clear signal on both sources. The CLUE experiment collected also data with the telescopes aiming directly at the Moon: we expect improvements also on the Moon Shadow measurement adopting the new method.

This paper describes the module of the drift chamber system used at CERN in a multiparticle magnetic spectrometer (FRAMM-NA1). Details are given about a new construction procedure which allows the quick and easy assembly of the chambers. Tests have been performed to check the construction accuracy, the detection efficiency and the final spatial resolutions, the results are reported. agger

Measurements were made of the differential cross sections for the charge exchange of K− mesons on protons at momenta of 25 and 40 GeV/c using a high-precision spectrometer with no magnetic field. In the range 5–40 GeV/c the reaction cross section follows a power-law dependence pK−−1.52. In the snall momentum transfer region (−t ⪅ mπ2) a minimum is observed, similar to that discovered at lower energies. The differential cross sections t = 0 are considerably less than those predicted by the Regge-pole model. The parameters of the effective trajectory are determined.

Results are given for the production differential cross sections and the ω decay angular distribution in terms of the ω spin density matrix elements.

A possibility of using clay waste rocks (shales) from coal mines in the removal of heavy metals from industrial wastewaters is considered in this paper. Raw and calcined (600 °C) shales accompanying the coal beds in two Polish coal mines were examined with respect to their adsorptive capabilities for Pb, Ni and Cu ions. The mineralogical composition of the shales was determined and the TG/DTG analysis was carried out. The granulometric compositions of raw and calcined shales were compared. Tests of adsorption for various Pb(II), Ni(II) and Cu(II) concentrations were conducted and the pH before and after adsorption was analyzed. The results indicate that the shales from both coal mines differ in adsorptive capabilities for particular metal ions. The calcination improved the adsorptive capabilities for lead, but worsened them for nickel. The examined shales have good adsorptive capabilities, and could be used as inexpensive adsorbents of heavy metal ions, especially in the regions where resources of shale are easy accessible in the form of spoil tips.

The muon telescopes of the Extreme Energy Events (EEE) Project [1] are made of three Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC). The EEE array is composed, so far, of 59 telescopes and is organized in clusters and single telescope stations distributed all over the Italian territory. They are installed in High Schools with the aim to join research and teaching activities, by involving researchers, teachers and students in the construction, maintenance, data taking and data analysis. The unconventional working sites, mainly school buildings with non-controlled environmental parameters and heterogeneous maintenance conditions, are a unique test field for checking the robustness, the low-ageing features and the long-lasting performance of the MRPC technology for particle tracking and timing purposes. The measurements performed with the EEE array require excellent performance in terms of time and spatial resolution, efficiency, tracking capability and stability. The data from two recent coordinated data taking periods, named Run 2 and Run 3, have been used to measure these quantities and the results are described, together with a comparison with expectations and with the results from a beam test performed in 2006 at CERN.

Abstract The PolarquEEEst scientific programme consists in a series of measurements of the cosmic ray flux up to the highest latitudes. It started in Summer 2018, when three telescopes made out of scintillators readout by SiPMs were built and installed in Italy, Norway and on a sailboat leaving from North Island, to circumnavigate the Svalbard archipelago and land in Tromsø. They collected data on a latitude range from 44° N up to 82° N, with a dense sampling of the Northernmost interval. The PolarquEEEst mission continued afterwards with a series of measurements in Italy, Southward reaching Lampedusa, and in Germany. In May 2019 the PolarquEEEst collaboration accomplished another important result, installing a cosmic ray observatory for the detection of secondary cosmic muons at Ny Alesund, at 79° N, made of three independent identical detectors positioned a few hundred meters from each other, and synchronized in order to operate together as a network. The configuration used will allow high precision measurements never performed before at these latitudes on a long term, also interesting for their connection with environmental phenomena. The network will also complement the existing stations for the detection of cosmic neutrons at the Svalbard archipelago, enlarging by far the physics scope that is possible to pursue in this field at this peculiar location. Here the various missions are presented, and some preliminary results from the measurements performed are shown.

Abstract The goal of the PolarquEEEst experiment was to measure the cosmic charged particle rate at latitudes greater than 66 $$^{\circ }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:msup><mml:mrow /><mml:mo>∘</mml:mo></mml:msup></mml:math> N, where no systematic and accurate measurements at sea level have ever been performed. A latitude range well above the Arctic Circle was explored on board of a sailboat, up to the unprecedented northernmost value of $$82^{\circ }07^{\prime }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msup><mml:mn>82</mml:mn><mml:mo>∘</mml:mo></mml:msup><mml:msup><mml:mn>07</mml:mn><mml:mo>′</mml:mo></mml:msup></mml:mrow></mml:math> N. In this paper a description of the experimental set-up is reported, then the procedures for calibration and data analysis are described in detail. The results show that the rate measured in this latitude range stays constant within a novel accuracy of $$\pm 1$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:mo>±</mml:mo><mml:mn>1</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:math> %.

We present the results of a test with a prototype apparatus aimed to detect the ultraviolet Cherenkov light in the wavelength range 2000–2300 Å, emitted by high energy cosmic ray showers. The system consists of a gas proportional chamber, with TMAE vapour as the photosensitive element, placed on the focal plane of a 1.5 m diameter parabolic mirror. The test was done during the summer of 1989 with cosmic ray showers seen in coincidence with the EAS-TOP experiment, an extended atmospheric shower charged particle array now being exploited at Campo Imperatore, 1900 m above sea level, on top of the Gran Sasso underground Laboratory of INFN. The results were positive and show that a full scale ultraviolet Cherenkov experiment with good sensitivity, angular resolution and virtually no background from moonlight or even daylight can be envisaged.

The major reason for building a vertex detector for CDF is the tagging of decay vertices of particles with lifetime in the 10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> 3/10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> 2 sec. range. This is a complementary approach to heavy flavour physics with respect to missing E <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">t</sub> and large P <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">t</sub> leptons. The method can be best applied to tag hadronic decays of heavy flavours, which have the largest branching ratios, but have eluded any specific tagging until now. It also works, although with somewhat reduced efficiency, in events with a semileptonic decay. All in all it promises to be a powerful tool in the search of rather elusive processes like Higgs, top, or fourth generation quark production [1]. The additional information provided by the vertex detector will also improve significantly the resolution of the CDF central tracking system [2].

All γ's and the neutron from the reaction π−p → π0π0n are detected. The magnitude of the π0 π0 S-wave and the cosine of its phase angle (relative to the known D-wave) are determined. The I = 0 amplitude, S0, is near the unitarity limit in the range 600 to 900 MeV and again around 1200 MeV.

New scintillation counters have been designed and constructed for upgrading the CDF detector at Fermilab Tevatron. A novel light collection technique using wavelength shifting fibers, together with a high-quality polystyrene-based scintillator UPS 923A, has resulted in compact counters with good and stable light collection efficiency over their lengths extending up to 320 cm. The design, construction, and performance of the counters are presented. Properties of the fibers and the scintillator, such as light output, light attenuation, decay time, and long-term stability, are investigated. It is found that the polystyrene-based scintillator, unlike the polyvinyltoluene-based one, has properties more adequate for long-term experiments.

The TOTEM T2 telescope will measure inelastically produced charged particles in the forward region of the LHC Interaction Point 5. Each arm of the telescope consists in a set of 20 triple-GEM (Gas Electron Multiplier) detectors with tracking and trigger capabilities. The GEM technology has been considered for the design of TOTEM very forward T2 telescopes thanks to its characteristics: large active areas, good position and timing resolution, excellent rate capability and radiation hardness. Each of the four T2 half arms has been fully assembled and equipped with electronics at CERN and systematically tested in the SPS beam line H8 in 2008/09. After some optimization, the operation of the GEM chambers was fully satisfactory and the T2 telescopes were installed and commissioned in their final positions at the LHC interaction point. During the first LHC run (December 2009) the T2 telescopes have collected data, at 900 GeV and 2.36 TeV. We will present here the performances of the detector and the preliminary results obtained using the data collected.

The TOTEM experiment is dedicated to the measurement of the total proton–proton cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and the study of elastic and diffractive scattering processes. Two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, integrated in the CMS detector, cover the pseudo-rapidity region between 3.1 and 6.5 on both sides of the interaction point IP5. The Roman Pot (RP) stations are located at distances of ±147 m and ±220 m with respect to the interaction point to measure the very forward scattered protons at very small angles. During the LHC technical stop in winter 2010/2011, the TOTEM experiment was completed with the installation of the T1 telescope and the RP stations at ±147 m. In 2011, the LHC machine provided special optics with the large ß⁎=90 m, allowing TOTEM to measure the elastic scattering differential cross-section, down to the four-momentum transfer squared |t|=2×10−2 GeV2. Using the optical theorem and extrapolation of the differential cross-section to t=0 (optical point), the total p–p cross-section at the LHC energy of s=7TeV could be computed for the first time. Furthermore we measured with standard LHC beam optics and the energy of s=7TeV the forward charged particle pseudorapidity density dn/dη in the range of 5.3<|η|<6.4. The status of the experiment, the performance of the detectors with emphasis on the RPs are described and the first physics results are presented.

The Extreme Energy Events (EEE) ‘telescope’ is made by 3 Multigap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC), each with an active area of 158x82 cm2 in size. Each detector is part of a large network of about sixty telescopes spread over the Italian territory. Due to the good tracking capabilities (100 ps time resolution and cm2 spatial resolution) the EEE telescope can be used also as test station for large area detectors. The link between the EEE track and signals from the detector under test can be obtained by implementing a streaming DAQ with a common time reference between the two systems given by the GPS signal. The installation and first results of the cosmic muon test facility with the EEE MRPC telescope based on the low-cost, streaming-compatible 12 channels, 250MHz, 14 bits digitizer (INFN-WaveBoard or WB) developed by the JLAB12 Collaboration, is presented.

Abstract After its successful campaign of measurements beyond the Polar Arctic Circle, the PolarquEEEst experiment measured the cosmic charged particle rate at sea level in a latitude interval between 35 $$^{\circ }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow /> <mml:mo>∘</mml:mo> </mml:msup> </mml:math> N and 82 $$^{\circ }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow /> <mml:mo>∘</mml:mo> </mml:msup> </mml:math> N. In this paper, these measurements are described and the corresponding results are discussed.

Multi-electrode germanium detectors are being used as an active target for decay path measurements of charmed mesons. The procedure used to fabricate such detectors is described and a brief analysis of their performance is given.