Four-momentum transfer between two groups of particles produced in ultra-high energy interactions is studied employing 3000-BeV Monte Carlo jets generated for an earlier paper from information based largely on experimentally determined average properties of ${10}^{12}$-eV jets. First, a parameter introduced by Hasegawa and Yokoi for measuring a deliberate underestimate of this four-momentum transfer is calculated using the Monte Carlo jets. In general, the results agree with the experimental findings of Fujioka et al., in that the values of this parameter are concentrated above one nucleon mass. Detailed differences between the Monte Carlo and the experimental distributions may be explained by differences between properties of the Monte Carlo and the experimental jets after clarification of the properties of the parameter. Next, after assuming values of the masses and the transverse momenta of the baryons surviving the collision, it was possible to calculate the actual value of the four-momentum transfer between two groups of the produced particles for the Monte Carlo jets. The Hasegawa and Yokoi parameter is found to underestimate this actual value by a factor of about 0.6±0.2, the limits defining the approximate 68% confidence interval for statistical fluctuations of individual measurements about the mean factor 0.6. Finally, the distribution of this actual value itself shows a mean around two nucleon masses, indicating that jets having average properties like the Monte Carlo jets belong to a different class of events from those encompassed by "linked-peripheral" models for which virtual $\pi$-meson transfer predominates.

• Received 20 December 1963

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.135.B153