Speaker
Dr
Kieran Boyle
(RIKEN BNL Research Center)
Description
During 12 years of operations, PHENIX has measured the gluon helicity structure of the proton, probed the proton transverse spin structure, studied effects in cold nuclear matter, discovered a strongly coupled QGP and has studied many of its basic properties. In parallel with ongoing luminosity upgrades at RHIC, PHENIX is in the process of planning and commissioning a series of upgrades in order to systematically expand its physics capabilities, allowing measurement of the sea quark helicity distributions, the low x gluon distribution in heavy nuclei and charm and bottom quark production in Heavy Ion collisions. PHENIX is also planning a larger upgrade for the next decade to answer many of the questions spurred by our discoveries during the last decade. With increased acceptance and improved electromagnetic and new hadronic calorimetry in the central region, we will advance understanding of the sQGP by studying jet energy loss. We also plan to upgrade our forward physics detector with additional calorimetry and tracking acceptance. This will allow for measurements of the Sivers effect in Drell-Yan, which can test our understanding of QCD factorization. The larger acceptance will improve our access to low x distributions in heavy nuclei, and also enable measurements of jets in the forward direction, which will allow for a more systematic approach to understanding the large transverse spin measurements seen at RHIC.
Primary author
Dr
Kieran Boyle
(RIKEN BNL Research Center)
