Constituent quark number scaling from strange hadron spectra in pp collisions at
TeV Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (11575100), and by Shandong Province Natural Science Foundation(ZR2019YQ06, ZR2019MA053), and by A Project of Shandong Province Higher Educational Science and Technology Program (J18KA228)
Jian-Wei Zhang (
School of Physics and Engineering, Qufu Normal University, Shandong 273165, China); Hai-Hong Li (
Department of Physics, Jining University, Shandong 273155, China); Feng-Lan Shao (
School of Physics and Engineering, Qufu Normal University, Shandong 273165, China); Jun Song (
Department of Physics, Jining University, Shandong 273155, China)
We show that the
spectra of
and
at midrapidity in the inelastic events in
collisions at
13 TeV exhibit a constituent quark number scaling property, which is a clear signal of quark combination mechanism at hadronization. We use a quark combination model with equal velocity combination approximation to systematically study the production of identified hadrons in
collisions at
= 13 TeV. The midrapidity
spectra for protons,
,
,
,
and
in the inelastic events are simultaneously fitted by the model. The multiplicity dependence of the yields of these hadrons are also well understood. The strong
dependence of the
ratio is well explained by the model, which further suggests that the production of two hadrons with similar masses is determined by their quark content at hadronization. The
spectra of strange hadrons at midrapidity in different multiplicity classes in
collisions at
13 TeV are predicted for further tests of the model. The midrapidity
spectra of soft (
GeV/c) strange quarks and up/down quarks at hadronization in
collisions at
13 TeV are extracted.