$ϕ$ meson production in the forward/backward rapidity region in Cu$+$Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=200$ GeV

Abstract

The PHENIX experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) has measured $ϕ$ meson production and its nuclear modification in asymmetric Cu$+$Au heavy-ion collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=200$ GeV at both forward Cu-going direction ($1.2<y<2.2$) and backward Au-going direction ($-2.2<y<-1.2$), rapidities. The measurements are performed via the dimuon decay channel and reported as a function of the number of participating nucleons, rapidity, and transverse momentum. In the most central events, 0\%--20\% centrality, the $ϕ$ meson yield integrated over $1<p_T<5$ GeV/$c$ prefers a smaller value, which means a larger nuclear modification, in the Cu-going direction compared to the Au-going direction. Additionally, the nuclear-modification factor in Cu$+$Au collisions averaged over all centrality is measured to be similar to the previous PHENIX result in $d$$+$Au collisions for these rapidities.

512 authors, 15 pages, 11 figures, 8 tables, 2009 and 2012 data. v2 is the version accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. C. Plain text data tables for the points plotted in figures for this and previous PHENIX publications are (or will be) publicly available at http://www.phenix.bnl.gov/papers.html