Meson Production in Proton-Proton and Antiproton - Interactions at Center of Mass Energy = 24.3 GEV

Experiment UA6 measured the inclusive production cross section of pi^0, eta, and omega mesons in the p_{T} range 3.5 to 6.1 GeV/c in the reactions;eqalignno {p + p&to M + Xcrnoalign{hbox {rm and}}|{p} + p& to M + Xcr}where M represents a meson and X any other associated particles, at center of mass energy sqrt{s} = 24.3 GeV. The experiment was located at the CERN SppS collider and utilized a fixed hydrogen gas jet as the target in oppositely circulating proton and antiproton beams of momenta 315 GeV/c. The apparatus could be rotated to select either proton-proton or antiproton-proton interactions. The meson production cross section results were obtained from the analysis of 3.7 inverse picobarns (pb ^{-1}) of pp data collected in 1988 and 3.2 pb^{-1} of pp data collected in 1989. The eta/pi ^0 production ratio is measured to be 0.61 +/- 0.03 +/- 0.07 for pp and 0.62 +/- 0.03 +/- 0.07 for pp. The omega/ pi^0 production ratio is measured to be 0.87 +/- 0.16 +/- 0.13 for pp and 0.84 +/- 0.16 +/- 0.13 for pp. The inclusive pi^0 cross section is determined as a function of p_{T} averaged over the rapidity range 0.6 <= y <= 1.2. Comparison of the production between pp and pp reveals no significant difference. The cross section and production ratios are also compared with results from other experiments and found to be in agreement.