Speaker
Description
Ultra-peripheral collisions (UPCs) are photon-mediated collisions between relativistic heavy ions, including photonuclear and two-photon reactions. They are the energy frontier for photonic interactions, with the gamma-p center of mass energies exceeding 5 TeV in proton-proton collisions, and per-nucleon center of mass energies above 700 GeV in gamma-lead collisions. After introducing UPCs, I will give an overview of recent UPC results, with an emphasis in three areas: the low-x partonic structure of heavy nuclei, Searches for Beyond Standard Model particles such as axions, and gamma-A collisions as a `small system’ to study hadronization. I will conclude with some thoughts about the future, including the relationship with the U. S. electron-ion collider.
