Particle production in $p$-O collisions at LHC energy

Abstract: We compare our previous predictions for charged-hadron production in $p$-O collisions at an energy of $\sqrt{s_\mathrm{NN}}=9.618$ TeV as published in 2025 with preliminary Run 3 data from ALICE and adapt the model parameters to the data. Our three-source model comprises a gluon-gluon central source and two valence-quark soft-gluon fragmentation sources. We describe the initial conditions using color-glass-condensate states and calculate the time-dependent partial thermalization with a relativistic diffusion model. An inversion of the maximum production amplitude at larger pseudorapidities from backward to forward towards peripheral collisions is predicted.