ALICE INDICO

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ALICE Calendar

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ALICE is optimized to study the collisions of nuclei at the ultra-relativistic energies provided by the LHC. The aim is to study the physics of strongly interacting matter at the highest energy densities reached so far in the laboratory. In such conditions, an extreme phase of matter - called the quark-gluon plasma - is formed. Our universe is thought to have been in such a primordial state for the first few millionths of a second after the Big Bang, before quarks and gluons were bound together to form protons and neutrons. Recreating this primordial state of matter in the laboratory and understanding how it evolves will allow us to shed light on questions about how matter is organized and the mechanisms that confine quarks and gluons. For this purpose, we are carrying out a comprehensive study of the hadrons, electrons, muons, and photons produced in the collisions of heavy nuclei (²⁰⁸Pb). ALICE is also studying proton-proton and proton-nucleus collisions both as a comparison with nucleus-nucleus collisions and in their own right. In 2021, the collaboration completed a major upgrade, denoted ALICE 2, to enhance its detector capabilities and continue its scientific journey at the LHC in Runs 3 and 4. Further detector upgrades are being carried out for Run 4 until the end of 2033. At the same time, preparations are in progress for ALICE 3, the next-generation heavy-ion experiment for HL-LHC Run 5.

Diversity and Inclusivity in ALICE

The ALICE Collaboration embraces and values the diversity of its team members and colleagues. We are committed to fostering an inclusive environment for all people regardless of their nationality/culture, profession, age/generation, family situation and gender, as well as individual differences such as but not limited to ethnic origin, sexual orientation, belief, disability, or opinions provided that they are consistent with the Organization’s values.

Recent highlights

Latest ALICE Submissions

Three-baryon femtoscopy as an effective 3$\rightarrow$3 scattering experimentScattering experiments have long been the gold standard for constraining hadron$-$hadron interactions, providing direct information on the angular momentum and spin dependence over a wide range of kinematic configurations. However, experimental constraints on three-body dynamics remain limited, specifically for unbound systems and systems involving short-lived hadrons. In this work, the three-proton correlation function is measured in pp collisions at $\sqrt{s}=13.6$ TeV with ALICE at the LHC and presented as a novel approach to access hadronic interactions in three-body systems. A new analysis strategy is employed to isolate the p$-$p$-$p contribution to the correlation function by correcting for background channels and experimental effects, and enabling a direct comparison with state-of-the-art three-body continuum calculations. The extracted correlation function provides the first direct access to the isospin $3/2$ three-body system. The measured observable is found to be sensitive to the partial-wave structure of the nucleon$-$nucleon interaction and indicates that the nuclear interaction acts even at high angular momentum and parity states of the three-body system, revealing an effective long-range attractive component, observed experimentally for the first time in a three-proton continuum system. Hence, three-hadron femtoscopy emerges as an effective 3$\rightarrow$3 scattering experiment with three unbound hadrons in initial and final states. The copious production of hyperons at the modern high-energy colliders ensures the possibility of extending such measurements beyond nucleons, opening a new avenue for future precision studies of three-body dynamics in the strangeness sector.	2608.05708
First measurement of $\mathbf{\rm Ξ_{\rm c}^{0}}$ production in $\mathbf{Pb}-\mathbf{Pb}$ collisions at $\mathbf{\sqrt{\textit{s}_{\rm NN}}}$ = 5.02 TeVThe ALICE Collaboration reports the first measurement of the production of prompt $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}$ baryons in nucleus$-$nucleus collisions by analyzing data from $\mathrm{Pb}-\mathrm{Pb}$ collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}~=5.02~\mathrm{TeV}$. The production and transverse-momentum ($p_{\mathrm T}$) differential spectra of $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}$ are particularly sensitive to the hadronization process and to strangeness production in the quark--gluon plasma formed in high-energy heavy-ion collisions. The $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}$ baryons are reconstructed at midrapidity ($\|y\| < ~0.5$) in the transverse-momentum intervals $3 < ~p_{\mathrm T}~ < ~12~\mathrm{GeV}/c$ and $4 < ~p_{\mathrm T}~ < ~12~\mathrm{GeV}/c$ in the 0$-$10\% and 30$-$50\% centrality intervals, respectively. The nuclear modification factor ($R_{\mathrm{AA}}$) reaches values up to 3 in the interval $3 < ~p_{\mathrm T}~ < ~4~\mathrm{GeV}/c$, which is the largest value measured so far for charm hadrons. Model predictions are compatible with the measured $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$, while, in the measured $p_{\mathrm T}$ intervals, they underestimate the production yield as well as the measured $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}/\mathrm{D}^{0}$, $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}/Λ_{\mathrm c}^{+}$, and $Ξ_{\mathrm c}^{0}/\mathrm{D}^{+}_{\mathrm s}$ yield ratios.	2607.17903
Multiplicity dependence of the size of the common hadron emission source in pp collisions at the LHCFemtoscopic analysis can shed light on hadron production in pp collisions. In this paper, proton-proton correlations measured in collisions at $\sqrt{s}=13.6$ TeV recorded with the ALICE detector at the LHC are presented. The analysis is based on the minimum bias dataset collected in 2022 following the upgrade of the ALICE detector and corresponds to an integrated luminosity of $19.3$ pb$^{-1}$. The increased integrated luminosity allows us, for the first time, to simultaneously measure the multiplicity and transverse-mass ($m_{\rm T}$) dependence of the size of the hadron-emitting source. Precise knowledge of the femtoscopic source size in pp collisions is a crucial ingredient for using femtoscopy to study the residual strong interaction among stable and unstable hadrons at the LHC. In this light, the source radius was determined from the measured correlation functions by assuming several state-of-the-art models of the nucleon$-$nucleon interactions. The consistency among the extracted radii demonstrates the robustness of the measurement with respect to interaction model assumptions. A comparison to femtoscopic radii measured in Pb$-$Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s}=5.02$ TeV reveals a markedly different multiplicity dependence in similar $m_{\rm T}$ intervals, providing new insight into the system-size dependence of particle emission dynamics.	2606.28098
Evidence for parton energy loss in oxygen$-$oxygen collisions at $\mathbf{\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}}=5.36}$ TeVUltra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions create a hot and dense medium of deconfined quarks and gluons, the quark$-$gluon plasma (QGP), in which parton energy loss ("jet quenching") is a key probe of hot medium properties. While parton energy loss has been firmly established in large systems such as Pb$-$Pb and Au$-$Au collisions, no unambiguous direct evidence exists in smaller systems such as high-multiplicity p$-$Pb and pp collisions. To probe the onset of parton energy loss at intermediate system size, measurements of neutral-pion production are presented in this Letter for oxygen$-$oxygen (OO) and proton$-$oxygen (pO) collisions recorded with the ALICE detector in July 2025, relative to a pp baseline. The nuclear modification factor $R_{\rm OO}$ is suppressed relative to unity with a transverse-momentum dependence similar to that observed in Pb$-$Pb collisions, consistent with a previous CMS measurement in OO collisions with charged particles. As $R_{\rm OO}$ contains contributions from both cold and hot nuclear matter effects, $R_{\rm pO}$ is also presented in order to constrain cold nuclear matter (CNM) contributions. $R_{\rm pO}$ is found to be compatible with unity, indicating that CNM effects alone cannot account for the suppression observed in $R_{\rm OO}$. Final-state effects are isolated using the measured double ratio $R_{\rm OO} \left/ R_{\rm pO}^2 \right.$, which largely cancels CNM contributions and exhibits a significant suppression relative to expectations without energy loss at a $4.9σ$ level. Theoretical models incorporating parton energy loss via different mechanisms predict a significant suppression of the $R_{\rm OO} \left/ R_{\rm pO}^2 \right.$ relative to unity, consistent with the data. These findings establish parton energy loss in OO collisions, extending experimental evidence for jet quenching to the smallest nuclear system studied to date.	2606.19967
Precision mass measurements of multistrange baryons and their antiparticlesThe $Ω^-$ baryon, composed of three strange quarks (sss), was predicted by the quark model and discovered in 1964, playing a pivotal role in establishing quarks as fundamental constituents of matter. Despite its importance, experimental knowledge of its mass remains limited, with the current world average relying on measurements performed more than four decades ago and lacking robust estimates of systematic uncertainties. This is notable given the central role of the $Ω^-$ mass, and alternatively that of the $Ξ^-$(dss), in lattice QCD calculations, where it is widely used to set the overall physical scale. Precise scale setting is essential for first-principles studies of quark confinement, chiral symmetry breaking, and stringent tests of the Standard Model. Here we report high-precision measurements of the masses of the $Ω^-$ and $Ξ^-$ baryons and their antiparticles, determined from invariant-mass reconstruction of their decay products in proton$-$proton collisions at the LHC. The analysis exploits the excellent tracking and particle-identification capabilities of the ALICE experiment, enabling accurate reconstruction of the displaced decay vertices characteristic of these short-lived particles. Each mass is measured with a fractional uncertainty of about 60 parts per million, for example $M_{\barΩ^+}=1672.558\,\pm\,0.034\,({\rm stat.})\,\pm\,0.102\,({\rm syst.})$ MeV/$c^2$. The precisely known K$^0_{\rm S}$ and $Λ$ masses are used for calibration. These results establish new precision benchmarks in strange-baryon spectroscopy and enable stringent tests of Charge-Parity-Time invariance in the multistrange-hadron sector. Our measurement reduces the scale uncertainty in lattice QCD calculations, enabling for instance sub per mille precision for the hadronic vacuum-polarization contribution to the muon anomalous magnetic moment.	2606.20144