First measurement of the |t|-dependence of coherent J/ψ photonuclear production

The first measurement of the cross section for coherent photoproduction as a function of , the square of the momentum transferred between the incoming and outgoing target nucleus, is presented. The data were measured with the ALICE detector in ultra-peripheral Pb–Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair with the produced in the central rapidity region , which corresponds to the small Bjorken-x range. The measured -dependence is not described by computations based only on the Pb nuclear form factor, while the photonuclear cross section is better reproduced by models including shadowing according to the leading-twist approximation, or gluon-saturation effects from the impact-parameter dependent Balitsky–Kovchegov equation. These new results are therefore a valid tool to constrain the relevant model parameters and to investigate the transverse gluonic structure at very low Bjorken-x.