Physics Programme for Data Taking 2002/03

The proposed physics program for the run 2002/03 concentrates on the physics feasible with the existing detector (The HERA-B detector is optimized for the detection of lepton pairs with high transverse momentum). The physics program includes the measurements of nuclear effects in charmonium production and the determination of the $b\bar b$ production cross section in proton-nucleon collisions by using the existing dilepton trigger. In addition by collecting Minimum Bias events , HERA-B offers the unique possibility to contribute to QCD physics. One of the topics is the production cross section of strange particles [#!herabphys!#,#!herabupd!#].

The main interest in the measurement of strange particle production cross section in nuclei is driven by heavy ion physics. In heavy ion collisions carried out at RHIC^1.1 at BNL^1.2 or SPS^1.3 at CERN^1.4 a strangeness enhancement is one of the major interests. It is believed that a strangeness enhancement could be a signature for the phase transition from quark-gluon plasma to normal nuclear matter.