Ds+ meson production at central rapidity in proton-proton collisions at s=7 TeV

The pT-differential inclusive production cross section of the prompt charm-strange meson Ds+ in the rapidity range |y|<0.5 was measured in proton-proton collisions at s=7 TeV at the LHC using the ALICE detector. The analysis was performed on a data sample of 2.98×108 events collected with a minimum-bias trigger. The corresponding integrated luminosity is Lint=4.8nb−1. Reconstructing the decay Ds+→ϕπ+, with ϕ→K−K+, and its charge conjugate, about 480 Ds± mesons were counted, after selection cuts, in the transverse momentum range 2