Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2025) 140: 523
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-025-06415-9

Regular Article

Hadron production models’ prediction for $p_T$ distribution of charged hadrons in pp interactions at LHC energies

¹ Department of Physics, Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan, 23200, Mardan, Pakistan
² Department of Physics, College of Science, Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University, P.O. Box 84428, 11671, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
³ Hubei Key Laboratory of Energy Storage and Power Battery, School of Optoelectronic Engineering, School of New Energy, Hubei University of Automotive Technology, 442002, Shiyan, China
⁴ Department of Mathematics, Physics and Statistics, Faculty of Natural Sciences, University of Guyana, 101110, Georgetown, Guyana

^a 20220073@huat.edu.cn
^b ajaz@awkum.edu.pk

Received: 10 September 2024
Accepted: 9 May 2025
Published online: 12 June 2025

Abstract

In this work, we present transverse momentum ($p_{\text{T}}$) spectra of identified charged hadrons and their ratios in proton–proton (pp) collisions at $\sqrt{s}=7$ TeV and 13 TeV using Monte Carlo models. The study employs Pythia8.3 (including variants Pythia8.3_CR and Pythia8.3_noCR) and EPOS (including EPOS$_{4\text{-Hydro}}^{}$, EPOS$_{4\text{-noHydro}}^{}$, and EPOSLHC). Results are measured at mid-rapidity ($|y|<1$) in the $p_{\text{T}}$ range $0.1<p_{\text{T}}<1.7$ GeV/c (CMS analysis) and $0.1<p_{\text{T}}<6$ GeV/c (ALICE analysis). Comparisons with CMS and ALICE data reveal that EPOSLHC reproduces the spectra well for all identified charged hadrons and pion yields. However, it underestimates kaon yields and overestimates (anti-)proton yields. EPOS$_{4\text{-Hydro}}^{}$ agrees well with data for pions and (anti-)protons but overestimates kaons. Its agreement for all hadrons is limited to the high-$p_{\text{T}}$ region. EPOS$_{4\text{-noHydro}}^{}$ fails to describe most hadrons, except for pions at high $p_{\text{T}}$. For Pythia8.3 variants: Pythia8.3_CR successfully predicts pion yields but underestimates (anti-)protons at high $p_{\text{T}}$. It improves predictions for kaons, (anti-)protons, and their ratios ($p/\pi$, $K/\pi$), though it fails for high-$p_{\text{T}}$ pions. Pythia8.3_noCR matches pion yields but underestimates kaons and (anti-)protons, albeit with smaller discrepancies. The success of EPOSLHC is attributed to hadronic rescattering and flow effects. EPOS$_{4\text{-Hydro}}^{}$ benefits from hadronic cascades, core-corona effects, microcanonical decays, and rescattering, unlike EPOS$_{4\text{-noHydro}}^{}$, which lacks these features. Pythia8.3_CR outperforms Pythia8.3_noCR due to color reconnection (CR) and multiple parton interaction (MPI) parameters.