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Inclusive J/ψ productions in pp collisions at s=5.02, 7, and 13 TeV with the parton and hadron cascade model PACIAE

Jin-Peng Zhang1, Guan-Yu Wang1, Wen-Chao Zhang1,*, Bo Feng1, An-Ke Lei2, Zhi-Lei She3, Hua Zheng1, Dai-Mei Zhou4,†, Yu-Liang Yan5 et al.

Ben-Hao Sa5,4,‡

  • *Contact author: wenchao.zhang@snnu.edu.cn
  • †Contact author: zhoudm@mail.ccnu.edu.cn
  • ‡Contact author: sabhliuym35@qq.com
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Phys. Rev. C 113, 045210 – Published 20 April, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/99kw-bldg

Abstract

We investigate the inclusive J/ψ production in proton-proton (pp) collisions at center-of-mass energies s=5.02, 7, and 13 TeV using the parton and hadron cascade model PACIAE 4.0. This model extends PYTHIA 8.3 by incorporating partonic and hadronic rescatterings before and after hadronization, respectively. Compared to our earlier study [K.-F. Ye et al., Phys. Rev. C 109, 035201 (2024)], which considered only the color-singlet processes, the present work includes both the color-singlet and color-octet contributions within the nonrelativistic QCD (NRQCD) framework. In addition to the NRQCD, we also consider the contributions from the cluster collapse and weak decays of b hadrons. We find that the simulated inclusive J/ψ transverse momentum differential cross sections agree well with the experimental data at both the middle and forward rapidities. We provide a quantitative analysis of the relative contributions for different production mechanisms and their energy and rapidity dependence in the inclusive J/ψ production. Furthermore, we offer a quantification of the relative contributions of the various components and their energy and rapidity dependence in the NRQCD channels, including the direct production via the hard scattering and the feed-down from the decays of heavier charmonium states such as ψ(2S), χc0, χc1, and χc2. Finally, we examine the effects of partonic and hadronic rescatterings and offer the quantitative estimate of their impact on the J/ψ production. These results are entirely new and represent a significant step forward in understanding the mechanisms of the inclusive J/ψ production in high-energy pp collisions.

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Phys. Rev. C 113, 045210– Published 20 April, 2026
  • Received 17 November 2025
  • Revised 12 March 2026
  • Accepted 26 March 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

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