Particle (pseudo) rapidity distribution and the overlapping cylinder model in nucleus-nucleus collisions at high energies

The overlapping cylinder model (OCM) is used in this letter to describe the rapidity (or pseudorapidity) distributions of charged particles produced in nucleus-nucleus collisions at high energies. For the target experiments at the present accelerator energies, the same relative strengths of longitudinal flows are observed and two completely overlapping cylinders can give a description of the experimental data. A stronger longitudinal flow is observed and two partly overlapping cylinders are needed at higher energies (above 4A TeV). The (pseudo) rapidity distributions calculated by the overlapping cylinder model are in agreement with the available experimental data. (authors)