Lifetime Analysis at High Intensity Colliders Applied to the LHC

The beam lifetime is one of the main parameters to define the performance of a collider. In a super-conducting machine like the LHC, the lifetime determines the intensity reach for a given collimation cleaning. The beam lifetime can be calculated from the direct measurement of beam current. However, due to the noise in the beam current signal only an average lifetime over several seconds can be calculated. We propose here an alternative method, which uses the signal of the beam loss monitors in the vicinity of the primary collimators to get the instantaneous beam lifetime at the collimators. In this paper we compare the lifetime from the two methods and investigate the minimum lifetime over the LHC cycle for all the physics fills in 2011 and 2012. These data provide a reference for estimates of performance reach from collimator cleaning.