Abstract: Using the ATLAS detector, a centrality-dependent suppression has been observed in the yield of J/psi mesons produced in the collisions of lead ions at the Large Hadron Collider. In a sample of minimum-bias lead-lead collisions at a nucleon-nucleon centre of mass energy root s(NN) = 2.76 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of about 6.7 μb(-1), J/psi mesons are reconstructed via their decays to mu(+)mu(-) pairs. The measured J/psi yield, normalized to the number of binary nucleon-nucleon collisions, is found to significantly decrease from peripheral to central collisions. The centrality dependence is found to be qualitatively similar to the trends observed at previous, lower energy experiments. The same sample is used to reconstruct Z bosons in the mu(+)mu(-) final state, and a total of 38 candidates are selected in the mass window of 66 to 116 GeV. The relative Z yields as a function of centrality are also presented, although no conclusion can be inferred about their scaling with the number of binary collisions, because of limited statistics. This analysis provides the first results on J/psi and Z production in lead-lead collisions at the LHC.

Abstract: Measurements of inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions at the LHC provide direct sensitivity to the physics of jet quenching. In a sample of lead-lead collisions at root S-NN = 2.76 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of approximately 7 μb(-1), ATLAS has measured jets with a calorimeter system over the pseudorapidity interval vertical bar eta vertical bar < 2.1 and over the transverse momentum range 38 < pT <210 GeV. Jets were reconstructed using the anti-k(t) algorithm with values for the distance parameter that determines the nominal jet radius of R = 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5. The centrality dependence of the jet yield is characterized by the jet “central-to-peripheral ratio,” R-CP. Jet production is found to be suppressed by approximately a factor of two in the 10% most central collisions relative to peripheral collisions. R-CP varies smoothly with centrality as characterized by the number of participating nucleons. The observed suppression is only weakly dependent on jet radius and transverse momentum. These results provide the first direct measurement of inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions and complement previous measurements of dijet transverse energy imbalance at the LHC.

Abstract: This Letter describes the measurement of elliptic flow of charged particles in lead-lead collisions at root s(NN) = 2.76 TeV using the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The results are based on an integrated luminosity of approximately 7 μb(-1). Elliptic flow is measured over a wide region in pseudorapidity, vertical bar eta vertical bar < 2.5, and over a broad range in transverse momentum, 0.5 < p(T) < 20 GeV. The elliptic flow parameter nu(2) is obtained by correlating individual tracks with the event plane measured using energy deposited in the forward calorimeters. As a function of transverse momentum, nu(2)(p(T)) reaches a maximum at p(T) of about 3 GeV. then decreases and becomes weakly dependent on p(T) above 7-8 GeV. Over the measured pseudorapidity region, nu(2) is found to be only weakly dependent on eta, with less variation than observed at lower beam energies. The results are discussed in the context of previous measurements at lower collision energies, as well as recent results from the LHC.