Photoproduction of light vector mesons in Xe-Xe ultraperipheral collisions at the LHC and the nuclear density of Xe-129

Abstract

We make predictions for cross sections of $\rho$ and $\varphi$ vector meson photoproduction in ultraperipheral Xe-Xe collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=5.44$ TeV. Analyzing the momentum transfer distribution of $\rho$ mesons in this process, we explore the feasibility of extracting the nuclear density of ${}^{129}$Xe, which is needed in searches for dark matter with Xenon-based detectors.

Comments: 8 pages, 4 figures. Final published version