Quarkonium Suppression from Coherent Energy Loss in Fixed-Target Experiments Using LHC Beams
Quarkonium production in proton-nucleus collisions is a powerful tool to disentangle cold nuclear matter effects. A model based on coherent energy loss is able to explain the available quarkonium suppression data in a broad range of rapidities, from fixed-target to collider energies, suggesting coherent energy loss in cold nuclear matter to be the dominant effect in quarkonium suppression in p-A collisions. This could be further tested in a high-energy fixed-target experiment using a proton or nucleus beam. The nuclear modification factors of<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M1"><mml:mi mathvariant="normal">J</mml:mi><mml:mo>/</mml:mo><mml:mi mathvariant="normal">ψ</mml:mi></mml:math>and<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M2"><mml:mrow><mml:mi mathvariant="normal">Υ</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math>as a function of rapidity are computed in p-A collisions at<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M3"><mml:msqrt><mml:mi>s</mml:mi></mml:msqrt><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>114.6</mml:mn></mml:math> GeV, and in p-Pb and Pb-Pb collisions at<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M4"><mml:msqrt><mml:mi>s</mml:mi></mml:msqrt><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mn>72</mml:mn></mml:math> GeV. These center-of-mass energies correspond to the collision on fixed-target nuclei of 7 TeV protons and 2.76 TeV (per nucleon) lead nuclei available at the LHC.