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Strangeness production in proton-lead collisions with ALICE at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)

Lead Research Organisation: University of Birmingham
Department Name: School of Physics and Astronomy

Abstract

My research is on the quark-gluon plasma. This is a state of matter in which the quarks and gluons become deconfined which only occurs at extreme temperatures and densities. These conditions are created in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC and are analysed using data taken by the ALICE experiment. By investigating the quark-gluon plasma we can get a better theoretical understanding of the strong force which is the force which usually confines quarks within hadrons. I look at one of the signatures of quark-gluon plasma formation called strangeness enhancement which was seen in the initial data from ALICE in lead-lead collisions as expected. However, we also found evidence of strangeness enhancement in some proton-proton and proton-lead collisions which was surprising as a quark-gluon plasma is not expected to form in these conditions. My research is looking at the latest proton-lead data taken at higher energies to investigate this phenomenon further.

Publications

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Studentship Projects

Project Reference Relationship Related To Start End Student Name
ST/N503939/1 30/09/2015 29/03/2021
1843572 Studentship ST/N503939/1 30/09/2016 30/03/2020 Emily Willsher