Precise measurement of the total cross section and the Coulomb scattering at the LHC

A precise measurement of the total cross section and the Coulomb scattering at LHC requires the observation of elastically scattered particles at extremely small angles (14 µrad, −t ≤ 0.01 GeV 2 for the first case; 3 µrad, −t ≤ 0.0006 GeV 2 ) for the second one). In this paper a very high-β insertion optics which fulfills both conditions is presented. A feasibility study, including the acceptance of the detectors, for an experiment to be installed in IR1 or IR5, is also presented.