Review of recent results on particle production from EMU01

Abstract The EMU01 Collaboration has employed emulsion chamber and pellicle detectors to accumulate a large database of heavy nucleus interactions. Samples include both minimum bias and central collisions, analyzed in a uniform manner to extract multiplicities and angular distributions of charged particles and nuclear fragments. We find that the main features of these distribution are well represented by geometrical superposition models. A unique feature of EMU01 is the use of emulsion chambers with thin foil targets to observe produced particle angular distributions with exceptionally high precision, permitting extension of fluctuations and correlations analyses beyond the resolution limits imposed by other experimental techniques. The data are generally well reproduced by interaction simulations such as FRITIOF (the Lund monte carlo for nuclear collisons) which include only conventional physics effects. However, the analysis of fluctuations and correlations via factorial moment and cumulant techniques yields some suggestive results which require further investigation, both by continued analysis of existing data and from Au and Pb beam exposures scheduled for the next few years.