Jet physics in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC with the ALICE detector

In central Pb-Pb collisions at the LHC, jet rates are expected to be high at energies at which jets can be fully reconstructed over the background of the underlying event. This will open the possibility of quantifying the effect of partonic energy loss through medium induced gluon radiation, jet quenching, by detailed measurement of the modification of the longitudinal and transverse structure of identified jets. We will present Monte Carlo simulations strongly indicating that, in order to obtain probes sensitive to the properties of the QCD medium, it is mandatory to measure the high-p /sub T/ parton fragments together with the low-p/sub T/ particles from the radiated gluons. Hence, the excellent charged particle tracking capabilities of ALICE with Delta p/p < 10% from 100 MeV-100 GeV combined with the proposed electromagnetic calorimeter for ALICE, EMCAL, represent an ideal tool for jet quenching studies at the LHC.