Beam losses from ultra-peripheral nuclear collisions between Pb ions in the Large Hadron Collider and their alleviation

Abstract

Electromagnetic interactions between colliding heavy ions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN will give rise to localized beam losses that may quench superconducting magnets, apart from contributing significantly to the luminosity decay. To quantify their impact on the operation of the collider, we have used a three-step simulation approach, which consists of optical tracking, a Monte-Carlo shower simulation and a thermal network model of the heat flow inside a magnet. We present simulation results for the case of Pb ion operation in the LHC, with focus on the ALICE interaction region, and show that the expected heat load during nominal Pb operation is 40% above the quench level. This limits the maximum achievable luminosity. Furthermore, we discuss methods of monitoring the losses and possible ways to alleviate their effect.

17 pages, 20 figures

References in corpus (2)

• The Physics of Ultraperipheral Collisions at the LHC
• First observations of beam losses due to bound-free pair production in a heavy-ion collider

Cited by in corpus (10)

• Bound-free pair production in ultra-relativistic ion collisions at the LHC collider: Analytic approach to the total and differential cross sections
• Testing Beam-Induced Quench Levels of LHC Superconducting Magnets
• Performance and luminosity models for heavy-ion operation at the CERN Large Hadron Collider
• Neutron emission in ultraperipheral Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=5.02$ TeV
• Bound-free pair production in relativistic nuclear collisions from the NICA to the HE LHC colliders
• Heavy ion beam loss mechanisms at an electron-ion collider
• Proton emission in ultraperipheral Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{{\text{s}}_{\text{NN}}}=5.02$ TeV
• Data-driven method to estimate contamination from light ion beam transmutation at colliders
• Charting the Luminosity Capabilities of the CERN Large Hadron Collider with Various Nuclear Species
• Commissioning and Operation