Luminosity (scattering theory)

In scattering theory and accelerator physics, luminosity (L) is the ratio of the number of events detected (dN) in a certain period of time (dt) to the cross-section (σ):

${\displaystyle L={\frac {1}{\sigma }}{\frac {dN}{dt}}.}$

It has the dimensions of events per time per area, and is usually expressed in the cgs units of cm⁻²·s⁻¹ or the non-SI units of b⁻¹·s⁻¹. In practice, L is dependent on the particle beam parameters, such as beam width and particle flow rate, as well as the target properties, such as target size and density.

A related quantity is integrated luminosity (L_int), which is the integral of the luminosity with respect to time:

${\displaystyle L_{\mathrm {int} }=\int L\ dt.}$

The luminosity and integrated luminosity are useful values to characterize the performance of a particle accelerator. In particular, all collider experiments aim to maximize their integrated luminosities, as the higher the integrated luminosity, the more data is available to analyze.