Measurement of the inclusive production of neutral meson K and neutral barion Lambda in proton-proton diffraction collisions at center-of-mass energy of 510 GeV in the STAR experiment at RHIC

Abstract

During proton-proton collisions, in small part of events, both protons survive and are scattered at very small angles, producing particles in the central rapidity region. This type of reaction (central diffraction) takes place by the exchange of two so called Pomerons, which in lowest order of QCD can be modelled as pairs of gluons. In the aforementioned process, central state with quantum numbers of a vacuum is produced, and the particles produced (or the products of their decays) can be measured. In this thesis my main focus is $K^0$ and $\Lambda^0$ measurement as a result of $p + p \to p + p + K^0(\Lambda^0) + X$ reaction at $\sqrt{s}=510$ GeV. Such process can be measured by STAR experiment at RHIC. Roman Pots detectors will be used to measure scattered protons, and central state detector will be used to measure the remaining produced particles. The aim of this analysis is to obtain diffractive yields with respect to various kinematic variables, which can further be used to calculate cross sections for this reaction