Forward Physics and QCD at the LHC and EIC

Hadron production at very forward rapidities is studied in high-energy proton-proton/ion scattering, lepton-proton/ion scattering, and cosmic ray physics and represents a topic of common interest to these fields. The forward region offers unique opportunities for exploring QCD in small-x and diffractive processes and to search for physics beyond the Standard Model, but it also presents specific experimental challenges in forward hadron detection. Important topics to be discussed within QCD include double-parton scattering, diffraction, BFKL dynamics, saturation, and the color glass condensate. Experimental signatures that will lead to a better understanding of these phenomena are elastic and exclusive processes, forward jet and particle production as well as vector meson, dilepton and photon production. Relevant topics in the search for physics beyond the Standard Model are anomalous couplings, axions and axion-like particles, neutrino properties and the nature of dark matter. The improvement of theoretical predictions and optimization of experimental observables will be central topics of discussion at this seminar. Its purpose is therefore to bring together theorists and experimentalists in high-energy collider experiments and cosmic ray physics, to review the status of forward physics, discuss the opportunities and challenges, and realize synergies between the different fields. Discussions will focus on theoretical predictions and their precision on the one hand and on present experiments at the LHC and RHIC, the forward physics program with the future EIC and FPF, and the connections with cosmic ray physics on the other hand.

The conference language will be English. The Wilhelm and Else Heraeus-Foundation bears the cost of full-board accommodation for all participants.