Centrality dependence of charged hadron production in deuteron+gold and nucleon+gold collisions at sNN=200 GeV

Abstract

We present transverse momentum (pT) spectra of charged hadrons measured in deuteron-gold and nucleon-gold collisions at sNN=200 GeV for four centrality classes. Nucleon-gold collisions were selected by tagging events in which a spectator nucleon was observed in one of two forward rapidity detectors. The spectra and yields were investigated as a function of the number of binary nucleon-nucleon collisions, ν, suffered by deuteron nucleons. A comparison of charged particle yields to those in p+p collisions show that yield per nucleon-nucleon collision saturates with ν for high momentum particles. We also present the charged hadron to neutral pion ratios as a function of pT. © 2008 The American Physical Society.