Effect of multiparticle collisions on pion production in relativistic heavy-ion reactions

Abstract

In the present work we discuss the effect of N-body processes on pion multiplicity in relativistic heavy-ion reactions. This effect is analyzed in the energy range from the pion threshold up to 2 GeV/nucleon, for several projectile-target systems. The analysis is carried out in the context of intranuclear cascade calculations. It is shown that the inclusion of multibaryonic collisions is a crucial element in the study of the pion production mechanisms, being strongly dependent on the adopted correlation range for the particles involved in the N-body processes. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}