Speaker
John Lajoie
(Iowa State University)
Description
The PHENIX upgrade program adds a set of silicon pixel detectors (the VTX and FVTX),
forward calorimetry (the NCC), and Level-1 trigger detectors (the Muon Trigger
Upgrade) to the baseline detector. These upgrades will enhance the ability of PHENIX
to pursue a rich program of spin physics in polarized proton collisions, in
particular at sqrt(s) = 500 GeV. The VTX and FVTX detectors will provide a larger x
range over which the gluon polarization (Delat-G/G) can be determined and allow for a
direct measurement of spin asymmetry in beauty production. The Nosecone Calorimeter
will provide high-segmentation electromagnetic calorimetry at high rapidity to open a
wide variety of channels through measurements of photons and electrons. It will also
provide improved constraints on parton kinematics. The Muon Trigger Upgrade will
allow the experiment to select high momentum muons from the decay of W bosons and
reject both beam-associated and low-momentum collision background, enabling the study
of quark and antiquark polarization in the proton trough the use of parity violating
(single longitudinal spin) asymmetries. The combination of all three of these
upgrades enable a complementary, comprehensive physics program. In many cases these
upgrades will work together to improve the quality of physics measurements and reduce
backgrounds. I will describe the various components of the upgrades, their
implementation, and the expected sensitivity for a variety of spin-related measurements.
Primary author
John Lajoie
(Iowa State University)
