• Energy Research

Abstract Measurements of differential cross sections are presented for inclusive isolated-photon production in pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV provided by the LHC and using 139 fb−1 of data recorded by the ATLAS experiment. The cross sections are measured as functions of the photon transverse energy in different regions of photon pseudorapidity. The photons are required to be isolated by means of a fixed-cone method with two different cone radii. The dependence of the inclusive-photon production on the photon isolation is investigated by measuring the fiducial cross sections as functions of the isolation-cone radius and the ratios of the differential cross sections with different radii in different regions of photon pseudorapidity. The results presented in this paper constitute an improvement with respect to those published by ATLAS earlier: the measurements are provided for different isolation radii and with a more granular segmentation in photon pseudorapidity that can be exploited in improving the determination of the proton parton distribution functions. These improvements provide a more in-depth test of the theoretical predictions. Next-to-leading-order QCD predictions from JETPHOX and SHERPA and next-to-next-to-leading-order QCD predictions from NNLOJET are compared to the measurements, using several parameterisations of the proton parton distribution functions. The measured cross sections are well described by the fixed-order QCD predictions within the experimental and theoretical uncertainties in most of the investigated phase-space region.

Abstract Non-ionizing energy loss causes bulk damage to the silicon sensors of the ATLAS pixel and strip detectors. This damage has important implications for data-taking operations, charged-particle track reconstruction, detector simulations, and physics analysis. This paper presents simulations and measurements of the leakage current in the ATLAS pixel detector and semiconductor tracker as a function of location in the detector and time, using data collected in Run 1 (2010–2012) and Run 2 (2015–2018) of the Large Hadron Collider. The extracted fluence shows a much stronger |z|-dependence in the innermost layers than is seen in simulation. Furthermore, the overall fluence on the second innermost layer is significantly higher than in simulation, with better agreement in layers at higher radii. These measurements are important for validating the simulation models and can be used in part to justify safety factors for future detector designs and interventions.

AbstractCross-sections for the production of a Z boson in association with two photons are measured in proton–proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. The data used correspond to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb$$^{-1}$$ - 1 recorded by the ATLAS experiment during Run 2 of the LHC. The measurements use the electron and muon decay channels of the Z boson, and a fiducial phase-space region where the photons are not radiated from the leptons. The integrated $$Z(\rightarrow \ell \ell )\gamma \gamma $$ Z ( → ℓ ℓ ) γ γ cross-section is measured with a precision of 12% and differential cross-sections are measured as a function of six kinematic variables of the $$Z\gamma \gamma $$ Z γ γ system. The data are compared with predictions from MC event generators which are accurate to up to next-to-leading order in QCD. The cross-section measurements are used to set limits on the coupling strengths of dimension-8 operators in the framework of an effective field theory.

AbstractThis paper presents a measurement of b-jet production in Pb+Pb and pp collisions at $$\sqrt{s_{_\text {NN}}}=5.02$$ s NN = 5.02  TeV with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurement uses 260 $$\text {pb}^{-1}$$ pb - 1 of pp collisions collected in 2017 and 1.4 $$\text {nb}^{-1}$$ nb - 1 of Pb+Pb collisions collected in 2018. In both collision systems, jets are reconstructed via the anti-$$k_{t}$$ k t algorithm. The b-jets are identified from a sample of jets containing muons from the semileptonic decay of b-quarks using template fits of the muon momentum relative to the jet axis. In pp collisions, b-jets are reconstructed for radius parameters $$R= 0.2$$ R = 0.2 and $$R= 0.4$$ R = 0.4 , and only $$R= 0.2$$ R = 0.2 jets are used in Pb+Pb collisions. For comparison, inclusive $$R= 0.2$$ R = 0.2 jets are also measured using 1.7 $$\text {nb}^{-1}$$ nb - 1 of Pb+Pb collisions collected in 2018 and the same pp collision data as the b-jet measurement. The nuclear modification factor, $$R_\text {AA}$$ R AA , is calculated for both b-jets and inclusive jets with $$R= 0.2$$ R = 0.2 over the transverse momentum range of 80–290 GeV. The nuclear modification factor for b-jets decreases from peripheral to central collisions. The ratio of the b-jet $$R_\text {AA}$$ R AA to inclusive jet $$R_\text {AA}$$ R AA is also presented and suggests that the $$R_\text {AA}$$ R AA for b-jets is larger than that for inclusive jets in central Pb+Pb collisions. The measurements are compared with theoretical calculations and suggest a role for mass and colour-charge effects in partonic energy loss in heavy-ion collisions.