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arXiv · 2503.21531

The impact of future $D$- and $B$-meson measurements with the SMOG2 program at LHCb on the determination of nuclear parton distribution functions

Abstract

We perform an analysis of the potential impact of future $D$- and $B$-meson measurement within the SMOG2 fixed-target program at the LHCb experiment on nuclear parton distribution functions. Following~\cite{Bursche:2018orf}, we assume that SMOG2 will collect data for five nuclear targets: He, Ne, Ar, Kr, Xe and hydrogen which will provide a baseline for constructing nuclear ratios. The analysis is performed by using the PDF reweighting method. We demonstrate that such a measurement will allow to considerably reduce the current uncertainties of the nuclear gluon distribution and, to some extent, even the uncertainties of the light sea-quark distributions. Furthermore, it will provide the first possibility to systematically study the current assumptions on the $A$-dependence of the nuclear parton distributions.

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Carlo Flore, Cynthia Hadjidakis, Daniel Kikoła, Aleksander Kusina, Anton Safronov. 2025-03-27. The impact of future $D$- and $B$-meson measurements with the SMOG2 program at LHCb on the determination of nuclear parton distribution functions. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physletb.2025.139554

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