This paper presents multiplicity measurements of $K_{\mathrm{S}}^0$, $\mathrm{\Lambda }$, and $\overline{\mathrm{\Lambda }}$ produced in $120\mathrm{GeV}/c$ proton-carbon interactions. The measurements were made using data collected at the NA61/SHINE experiment during two different periods. Decays of these neutral hadrons impact the measured ${\pi }^{+}$, ${\pi }^{-}$, $p$ and $\overline{p}$ multiplicities in the $120\mathrm{GeV}/c$ proton-carbon reaction, which are crucial inputs for long-baseline neutrino experiment predictions of neutrino beam flux. The double-differential multiplicities presented here will be used to more precisely measure charged-hadron multiplicities in this reaction, and to reweight neutral hadron production in neutrino beam Monte Carlo simulations.

• Received 2 November 2022
• Accepted 1 March 2023

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.107.072004

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP³.

Published by the American Physical Society