Energy dependence of coherent photonuclear production of J/ψ mesons in ultra-peripheral Pb-Pb collisions at √sNN = 5.02 TeV

The cross section for coherent photonuclear production of J/ψ is presented as a function of the electromagnetic dissociation (EMD) of Pb. The measurement is performed with the ALICE detector in ultra-peripheral Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of sNN = 5.02 TeV. Cross sections are presented in five different J/ψ rapidity ranges within |y| < 4, with the J/ψ reconstructed via its dilepton decay channels. In some events the J/ψ is not accompanied by EMD, while other events do produce neutrons from EMD at beam rapidities either in one or the other beam direction, or in both. The cross sections in a given rapidity range and for different configurations of neutrons from EMD allow for the extraction of the energy dependence of this process in the range 17 < W_{γ Pb,n} < 920 GeV, where W_{γ Pb,n} is the centre-of-mass energy per nucleon of the γPb system. This range corresponds to a Bjorken-x interval spanning about three orders of magnitude: 1.1 × 10 ⁻⁵ < x < 3.3 × 10 ⁻². In addition to the ultra-peripheral and photonuclear cross sections, the nuclear suppression factor is obtained. These measurements point to a strong depletion of the gluon distribution in Pb nuclei over a broad, previously unexplored, energy range. These results, together with previous ALICE measurements, provide unprecedented information to probe quantum chromodynamics at high energies. [Figure not available: see fulltext.]