Hyperon/meson ratios in rare high-multiplicityppcollisions at energies available at the Large Hadron Collider, and potential signatures for mini-quark-gluon plasma formation

We use the framework of the hijing/bb ̄ \= v2.0 model to simulate high-multiplicity (HM) $p+p$ collision events at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) to study observables sensitive to possible collective phenomena, such as strong longitudinal color fields (SLCF) modeled by an enhanced string tension (κ). We focus on the hyperon/meson yield ratios at center-of-mass (c.m.) energy √s $=$ 7 TeV, in the transverse momentum region, 1<pT<4 GeV/c. For minimum bias events these ratios are well described assuming an energy dependence κ=κ(s)=κ₀(s/s₀)0.040.16em0ex0.16em0exGeV/fm (κ₀ $=$ 1 GeV/fm), giving a value κ=2 GeV/fm at √s $=$ 7 TeV. We compare minimum bias (MB) events to simulated HM events assuming that κ(MB)=2 GeV/fm could grow to an extreme value of κ(HM)=5 GeV/fm that saturates the strangeness suppression factor. With this assumption the model predicts a very strong enhancement of (multi)strange baryon/meson ratios in HM events. If observed, such an enhancement could be also interpreted as a possible signature for formation in HM $p+p$ collision events of a deconfined but out of local thermal equilibrium mini-quark-gluon plasma (mQGP).