Abstract:
The production cross sections of mesons and charge conjugates are measured in proton-proton (pp) and PbPb collisions via the exclusive decay channel at a center-of-mass energy of 5.02 TeV per nucleon pair and within the rapidity range using the CMS detector at the LHC. The pp measurement is performed as a function of transverse momentum () of the mesons in the range of 7 to 50 GeV/c and is compared to the predictions of perturbative QCD calculations. The production yield in PbPb collisions is measured in two intervals, 7 to 15 and 15 to 50 GeV/c, and compared to the yield in pp collisions in the same kinematic region. The nuclear modification factor () is found to be for 7–15 GeV/c, and for 15–50 GeV/c, respectively. Within current uncertainties, the results are consistent with models of strangeness enhancement, and suppression by parton energy loss, as observed for the mesons.