Central collisions of 800-GeV protons with Ag/Br nuclei in nuclear emulsion

Central collisions of 800-GeV protons with the heavy components of nuclear emulsion, ${}_{}{}^{107}{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Ag}$ and ${}_{}{}^{80}{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Br}$, have been investigated to determine the characteristics of small-impact-parameter collisions and, by comparison with the analysis of inclusive proton-emulsion inelastic interactions and inelastic proton-nucleon collisions, to study the dependence of the interaction process on the mean number of intranuclear collisions 〈ν〉. The data are also compared with the results obtained in proton-emulsion collisions, both central and inclusive, at 200 GeV. The variations in the secondary-particle multiplicities and the normalized pseudorapidity density correlate with 〈ν〉 and demonstrate that proton-nucleus interactions, both central and inclusive, can be described adequately by the incoherent superposition of proton-nucleon collisions.