System Size, Energy, and Centrality Dependence of Pseudorapidity Distributions of Charged Particles in Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collisions

Abstract

We present the first measurements of the pseudorapidity distribution of primary charged particles in Cu+Cu collisions as a function of collision centrality and energy, [sqrt]s[subscript NN]=22.4, 62.4, and 200 GeV, over a wide range of pseudorapidity, using the PHOBOS detector. A comparison of Cu+Cu and Au+Au results shows that the total number of produced charged particles and the rough shape (height and width) of the pseudorapidity distributions are determined by the number of nucleon participants. More detailed studies reveal that a more precise matching of the shape of the Cu+Cu and Au+Au pseudorapidity distributions over the full range of pseudorapidity occurs for the same N[subscript part]/2A rather than the same N[subscript part]. In other words, it is the collision geometry rather than just the number of nucleon participants that drives the detailed shape of the pseudorapidity distribution and its centrality dependence at RHIC energies.