CERN Accelerating science

In the Standard Model of particle physics, elementary constituents of matter identified to date are quarks and gluons, generically called $\textit{partons}$ and obeying the strong interaction described by quantum chromodynamics (QCD). While partons are confined in hadrons under standard temperature and density conditions, the existence of a deconfined state, quark-gluon plasma (QGP), has been predicted by QCD for extreme thermodynamic conditions. This state of matter can be reached in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions such as produced at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and can be probed with many observables accessible to the ALICE experiment in particular. Prompt photons, emitted by high-energy partonic processes, constitute a key probe of hadronic matter. Insensitive to the strong interaction they can traverse the deconfined medium preserving primary information about a collision, and thus represent a valuable reference not affected by QGP $\textit{a priori}$. These photons can be identified with electromagnetic calorimetry and isolation techniques. Within this doctoral thesis, the isolated photon production has been measured in proton-proton and proton-lead collisions with the ALICE experiment. The results are in agreement with QCD predictions, including in a kinematic range unexplored by this observable thus far.