TOTEM: Prospects for Total Cross-Section and Luminosity Measurements

With the installation of the T1 telescope and the Roman Pot stations at 147 m from IP5, the detector apparatus of the TOTEM experiment has been completed during the technical stop in winter 2010/2011. After the commissioning of the dedicated beam optics with beta* = 90 m, a first measurement of the total pp cross-section sigma_tot and -- simultaneously -- the luminosity L will be possible in the upcoming running season 2011. The precision envisaged is 3 % and 4 % for sigma_tot and L, respectively. An ultimate beam optics configuration with beta* ~ 1 km will later reduce the uncertainty to the 1 % level.