Decreasing inelasticity with energy in pp collisions

Abstract

The energy dependence of inelasticity in the multiparticle production of high-energy hadronic interactions is studied. The similarity between multiparticle productions in pp (pp) and e+e- collisions leads to a complete picture of a universal hadronization process. Within this framework, the data of charged multiplicity at various collider energies are used to infer average inelasticity. The result shows that inelasticity in pp collisions decreases with increasing energy in the range of square root (s)=5-900GeV. Consequences of the extrapolation of such a decreasing inelasticity to energies 1014-1018 eV as well as other model predictions in a series of cosmic ray experiments are also addressed.