2013 Fill Quality Assurance

Faculty Sponsor

Shirvel Stanislaus

College

Arts and Sciences

Department/Program

Physics and Astronomy

Presentation Type

Poster Presentation

Symposium Date

Summer 7-23-2021

Abstract

The Solenoidal Tracker at RHIC (STAR) located at Brookhaven National Laboratory uses longitudinally polarized proton-proton collisions to study the gluon contribution to the spin of the proton. Using data from the 2013 longitudinally polarized proton-proton collisions ($\sqrt{s}$ = 510 GeV), the production of neutral pions ($\pi^0$) from these collisions are studied. The spin-dependent asymmetry of the neutral pion production, ($A_{LL}$), can be determined by analyzing the photons produced from the $\pi^0$ decays, as detected in the Endcap Electromagnetic Calorimeter (EEMC). The EEMC, positioned in an intermediate pseudorapidity range of 1 < $\eta$ < 2, is able to measure the energy and position of the electromagnetic shower from an incoming photon. From these measurements, the two-photon invariant mass spectrum can be reconstructed. This spectrum is then fitted using a skewed Gaussian function to represent the $\pi^0$ signal and a Chebyshev function to characterize the random two-photon background. Integrating the resulting Gaussian peak will determine the total number of $\pi^0$s. The $\pi^0$ $A_{LL}$ is calculated from the number of $\pi^0$s produced in collisions of protons with different spin alignments. Numerous tests must be made to authenticate the quality of the data being analyzed in this very large data set. The status of this analysis will be presented.

Biographical Information about Author(s)

My name is Brook Burbridge and I am a sophomore majoring in astronomy. I chose to work for STAR because of my interest in research as my future career. I hope to go to graduate school once I've received my Bachelor's Degree.

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