https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-011-1655-9
Regular Article - Experimental Physics
Production of pions, kaons and protons in pp collisions at 
with ALICE at the LHC
1
Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Avanzate dell’Università del Piemonte Orientale and Gruppo Collegato INFN, Alessandria, Italy
2
Department of Physics, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, India
3
Nikhef, National Institute for Subatomic Physics, Amsterdam, Netherlands
4
Physics Department, University of Athens, Athens, Greece
5
Dipartimento Interateneo di Fisica ‘M. Merlin’ and Sezione INFN, Bari, Italy
6
Sezione INFN, Bari, Italy
7
China Institute of Atomic Energy, Beijing, China
8
Department of Physics and Technology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway
9
Faculty of Engineering, Bergen University College, Bergen, Norway
10
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, USA
11
Institute of Physics, Bhubaneswar, India
12
School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
13
Dipartimento di Fisica dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Bologna, Italy
14
Sezione INFN, Bologna, Italy
15
Faculty of Mathematics, Physics and Informatics, Comenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia
16
Institute of Space Sciences (ISS), Bucharest, Romania
17
National Institute for Physics and Nuclear Engineering, Bucharest, Romania
18
KFKI Research Institute for Particle and Nuclear Physics, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
19
Dipartimento di Fisica dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Cagliari, Italy
20
Sezione INFN, Cagliari, Italy
21
Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, Brazil
22
Physics Department, University of Cape Town, iThemba Laboratories, Cape Town, South Africa
23
Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Catania, Italy
24
Sezione INFN, Catania, Italy
25
Physics Department, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India
26
Laboratoire de Physique Corpusculaire (LPC), Clermont Université, Université Blaise Pascal, CNRS-IN2P3, Clermont-Ferrand, France
27
Department of Physics, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA
28
Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
29
The Henryk Niewodniczanski Institute of Nuclear Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Cracow, Poland
30
Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa, Culiacán, Mexico
31
Research Division and ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI, GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, Germany
32
Institut für Kernphysik, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany
33
Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA
34
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR), Dubna, Russia
35
Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany
36
Institut für Kernphysik, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany
37
Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati, INFN, Frascati, Italy
38
Gangneung-Wonju National University, Gangneung, South Korea
39
Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute, Gatchina, Russia
40
European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), Geneva, Switzerland
41
Laboratoire de Physique Subatomique et de Cosmologie (LPSC), Université Joseph Fourier, CNRS-IN2P3, Institut Polytechnique de Grenoble, Grenoble, France
42
Centro de Aplicaciones Tecnológicas y Desarrollo Nuclear (CEADEN), Havana, Cuba
43
Kirchhoff-Institut für Physik, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany
44
Physikalisches Institut, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany
45
Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan
46
University of Houston, Houston, TX, USA
47
Physics Department, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India
48
Physics Department, University of Jammu, Jammu, India
49
Helsinki Institute of Physics (HIP) and University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland
50
Bogolyubov Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kiev, Ukraine
51
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
52
Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata, India
53
Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, Kolkata, India
54
Fachhochschule Köln, Köln, Germany
55
Faculty of Science, P.J. Šafárik University, Košice, Slovakia
56
Institute of Experimental Physics, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Košice, Slovakia
57
Laboratori Nazionali di Legnaro, INFN, Legnaro, Italy
58
Sección Física, Departamento de Ciencias, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, Peru
59
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA, USA
60
Division of Experimental High Energy Physics, University of Lund, Lund, Sweden
61
Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas Medioambientales y Tecnológicas (CIEMAT), Madrid, Spain
62
Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico
63
Instituto de Física, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico
64
Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados (CINVESTAV), Mexico City and Mérida, Mexico
65
Institute for Nuclear Research, Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia
66
Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics, Moscow, Russia
67
Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, Moscow, Russia
68
Russian Research Centre Kurchatov Institute, Moscow, Russia
69
Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, India
70
Institut für Kernphysik, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Münster, Germany
71
SUBATECH, Ecole des Mines de Nantes, Université de Nantes, CNRS-IN2P3, Nantes, France
72
Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
73
Budker Institute for Nuclear Physics, Novosibirsk, Russia
74
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA
75
Physics Department, Creighton University, Omaha, NE, USA
76
Institut de Physique Nucléaire d’Orsay (IPNO), Université Paris-Sud, CNRS-IN2P3, Orsay, France
77
Department of Physics, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
78
Dipartimento di Fisica dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Padova, Italy
79
Sezione INFN, Padova, Italy
80
Faculty of Nuclear Sciences and Physical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic
81
Institute of Physics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic
82
Institute for High Energy Physics, Protvino, Russia
83
Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Puebla, Mexico
84
Pusan National University, Pusan, South Korea
85
Nuclear Physics Institute, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Řež u Prahy, Czech Republic
86
Dipartimento di Fisica dell’Università ‘La Sapienza’ and Sezione INFN, Rome, Italy
87
Sezione INFN, Rome, Italy
88
Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique, IRFU, Saclay, France
89
Dipartimento di Fisica ‘E.R. Caianiello’ dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Salerno, Italy
90
California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA, USA
91
Departamento de Física de Partículas and IGFAE, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
92
Universidade de São Paulo (USP), São Paulo, Brazil
93
Russian Federal Nuclear Center (VNIIEF), Sarov, Russia
94
Department of Physics, Sejong University, Seoul, South Korea
95
Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea
96
Technical University of Split FESB, Split, Croatia
97
V. Fock Institute for Physics, St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia
98
Institut Pluridisciplinaire Hubert Curien (IPHC), Université de Strasbourg, CNRS-IN2P3, Strasbourg, France
99
University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
100
Dipartimento di Fisica dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Trieste, Italy
101
Sezione INFN, Trieste, Italy
102
University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Japan
103
Dipartimento di Fisica Sperimentale dell’Università and Sezione INFN, Turin, Italy
104
Sezione INFN, Turin, Italy
105
Nikhef and Institute for Subatomic Physics of Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands
106
Université de Lyon, Université Lyon 1, CNRS/IN2P3, IPN-Lyon, Villeurbanne, France
107
Soltan Institute for Nuclear Studies, Warsaw, Poland
108
Warsaw University of Technology, Warsaw, Poland
109
Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA
110
Zentrum für Technologietransfer und Telekommunikation (ZTT), Fachhochschule Worms, Worms, Germany
111
Hua-Zhong Normal University, Wuhan, China
112
Yerevan Physics Institute, Yerevan, Armenia
113
Rudjer Bošković Institute, Zagreb, Croatia
* e-mail: h.oeschler@gsi.de
Received:
14
January
2011
Revised:
11
April
2011
Published online:
15
June
2011
The production of π
+, π
−, K+, K−, p, and 
at mid-rapidity has been measured in proton-proton collisions at 
with the ALICE detector. Particle identification is performed using the specific energy loss in the inner tracking silicon detector and the time projection chamber. In addition, time-of-flight information is used to identify hadrons at higher momenta. Finally, the distinctive kink topology of the weak decay of charged kaons is used for an alternative measurement of the kaon transverse momentum (p
t) spectra. Since these various particle identification tools give the best separation capabilities over different momentum ranges, the results are combined to extract spectra from p
t=100 MeV/c to 2.5 GeV/c. The measured spectra are further compared with QCD-inspired models which yield a poor description. The total yields and the mean p
t are compared with previous measurements, and the trends as a function of collision energy are discussed.
© Springer-Verlag / Società Italiana di Fisica, 2011
