Experimental results on strong interactions in the NAL hydrogen bubble chamber

Abstract

This report presents a review of the data obtained on high-energy hadronic interactions in the 30-in. hydrogen bubble chamber at the National Accelerator Laboratory. The emphasis is on a presentation of the experimental results that have been acquired during the Laboratory's first year of operation. The five main topics discussed are (a) topological cross sections and multiplicity distributions, (b) studies of the diffraction process observed in some low multiplicity final states, (c) single particle inclusive spectra, (d) neutral particle production, and (e) multiparticle correlations. While most of the data come from pp collisions and may be compared to results from the ISR, some of the more recent results from πp interactions are included and are compared to πp data at lower energies as well as to the pp results. The comparison between the πp and pp data indicates the striking result that many of the properties of high energy collisions seem almost independent of the nature of the projectile and target particles and depend primarily on the available center-of-mass energy.