Moving long-range beam-beam encounters in heavy-ion colliders

Asymmetric ion beam collisions like proton-lead in the LHC or gold-deuteron in RHIC have become major components of heavy-ion physics programmes. The injection and ramp of two different ion species with the same magnetic rigidity and consequently unequal revolution frequencies generate moving long-range beam-beam encounters in the interaction regions of the collider. These encounters led to fast beam losses and can cause emittance blow-up as observed in RHIC in the early 2000s and, more recently, in 2015. Yet such effects are absent at the LHC so the difference between the two colliders requires explanation. Tools and models have been developed to describe the beam dynamics of moving long-range beam-beam encounters and to predict the evolution of emittance and other beam parameters. Besides presenting results for RHIC and the LHC we give an outlook for the HL-LHC and potential operational restrictions.