Analysis of D⁰ and D^*+-meson production in pp and p-Pb collisions with ALICE at the LHC

This thesis presents measurements of D-meson production in the central barrel of the ALICE detector in pp and p-Pb collisions. The reconstruction of D⁰ mesons in the hadronic channel D⁰→K^-π⁺ was studied in pp collisions at √(s)=7 TeV using a Bayesian particle identification (PID) method, in order to test the validity of this new approach. Comparisons were made between these results and those obtained with established PID methods. Consistency was found between the different approaches, as well as an increase of the signal-to-background ratio and a similar or greater statistical significance for most of the implementations of the Bayesian approach. Further measurements of D^*+→D⁰π⁺ were made as a function of charged-particle multiplicity in p-Pb collisions at √(s_NN)=5.02 TeV. The aim was to test the role of multi-parton interactions (MPI) and possible collective phenomena in small systems at LHC energies. The results for D^*+ mesons were consistent with the other D-meson species studied by ALICE (D⁰ and D⁺). The measurements against mid-rapidity multiplicity showed consistency with previous results from pp collisions; however, a slower increase of the relative D-meson yield was found as a function of multiplicity at large rapidity for p-Pb collisions than pp collisions. The results for both multiplicity estimators were reproduced by phenomenological models, both with and without viscous hydrodynamics.