Orateur
Description
Proton-proton collisions at the LHC generate a high-intensity collimated beam of neutrinos in the forward (beam) direction, characterised by energies of up to several TeV. The recent observation of LHC neutrinos by FASERν and SND@LHC signals that this hitherto ignored particle beam is now available for scientific inquiry. Here we quantify the impact that neutrino deep-inelastic scattering (DIS) measurements at the LHC would have on the PDFs of protons and heavy nuclei at current and future far-forward LHC neutrino experiments. We determine that up to one million electron- and muon-neutrino DIS interactions within detector acceptance can be expected by the end of the HL-LHC, covering a kinematic region overlapping with that of the Electron-Ion Collider. Including these DIS projections into global (n)PDF analyses, specifically PDF4LHC21, NNPDF4.0, and EPPS21, reveals a significant reduction of PDF uncertainties, in particular for strangeness and the up and down valence PDFs, and enables improved theoretical predictions for core processes at the HL-LHC, such as Higgs and weak gauge boson production. We also consider the possibility of extending the FCC-pp 100 TeV collider with far-forward neutrino detection capabilities.
