The ALICE experiment was proposed in 1993, to study strongly-interacting matter at extreme energy densities and temperatures. This proposal entailed a comprehensive investigation of nuclear collisions at the LHC. Its physics programme initially focused on the determination of the properties of the quark–gluon plasma (QGP), a deconfined state of quarks and gluons, created in such collisions. The ALICE physics programme has been extended to cover a broader ensemble of observables related to Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), the theory of strong interactions. The experiment has studied Pb–Pb, Xe–Xe, p–Pb and pp collisions in the multi-TeV centre of mass energy range, during the Run 1–2 data-taking periods at the LHC (2009–2018). The aim of this review is to summarise the key ALICE physics results in this endeavor, and to discuss their implications on the current understanding of the macroscopic and microscopic properties of strongly-interacting matter at the highest temperatures reached in the laboratory. It will review the latest findings on the properties of the QGP created by heavy-ion collisions at LHC energies, and describe the surprising QGP-like effects in pp and p–Pb collisions. Measurements of few-body QCD interactions, and their impact in unraveling the structure of hadrons and hadronic interactions, will be discussed. ALICE results relevant for physics topics outside the realm of QCD will also be touched upon. Finally, prospects for future measurements with the ALICE detector in the context of its planned upgrades will also be briefly described.

The production of $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0$ and $\varphi \left(1020\right)$ mesons in proton-proton ($pp$) and lead-lead (Pb-Pb) collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathit{NN}}}=2.76\mathrm{TeV}$ has been analyzed using a high luminosity data sample accumulated in 2011 with the ALICE detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Transverse momentum ($p_{\mathrm{T}}$) spectra have been measured for $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0$ and $\varphi \left(1020\right)$ mesons via their hadronic decay channels for $p_{\mathrm{T}}$ up to $20\mathrm{GeV}/c$. The measurements in $pp$ collisions have been compared to model calculations and used to determine the nuclear modification factor and particle ratios. The $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0/K$ ratio exhibits significant reduction from $pp$ to central Pb-Pb collisions, consistent with the suppression of the $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0$ yield at low $p_{\mathrm{T}}$ due to rescattering of its decay products in the hadronic phase. In central Pb-Pb collisions the $p_{\mathrm{T}}$ dependent $\varphi \left(1020\right)/\pi$ and $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0/\pi$ ratios show an enhancement over $pp$ collisions for $p_{\mathrm{T}}\approx 3\mathrm{GeV}/c$, consistent with previous observations of strong radial flow. At high $p_{\mathrm{T}}$, particle ratios in Pb-Pb collisions are similar to those measured in $pp$ collisions. In central Pb-Pb collisions, the production of $K^{*}{\left(892\right)}^0$ and $\varphi \left(1020\right)$ mesons is suppressed for $p_{\mathrm{T}}>8\mathrm{GeV}/c$. This suppression is similar to that of charged pions, kaons, and protons, indicating that the suppression does not depend on particle mass or flavor in the light quark sector.

In this work, we propose a regression method to predict the popularity of an online video measured by its number of views. Our method uses Support Vector Regression with Gaussian radial basis functions. We show that predicting popularity patterns with this approach provides more precise and more stable prediction results, mainly thanks to the nonlinear character of the proposed method as well as its robustness. We prove the superiority of our method against the state of the art using datasets containing almost 24 000 videos from YouTube and Facebook. We also show that using visual features, such as the outputs of deep neural networks or scene dynamics' metrics, can be useful for popularity prediction before content publication. Furthermore, we show that popularity prediction accuracy can be improved by combining early distribution patterns with social and visual features and that social features represent a much stronger signal in terms of video popularity prediction than the visual ones.

Invariant differential yields of deuterons and antideuterons in $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 0.9, 2.76 and 7 TeV and the yields of tritons, ${}^3\mathrm{He}$ nuclei, and their antinuclei at $\sqrt{s}$ = 7 TeV have been measured with the ALICE detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurements cover a wide transverse momentum ($p_{\text{T}}$) range in the rapidity interval $\left|y\right|<0.5$, extending both the energy and the $p_{\text{T}}$ reach of previous measurements up to 3 GeV/$c$ for $A=2$ and 6 GeV/$c$ for $A=3$. The coalescence parameters of (anti)deuterons and ${}^3\overline{\text{He}}$ nuclei exhibit an increasing trend with $p_{\text{T}}$ and are found to be compatible with measurements in $pA$ collisions at low $p_{\text{T}}$ and lower energies. The integrated yields decrease by a factor of about 1000 for each increase of the mass number with one (anti)nucleon. Furthermore, the deuteron-to-proton ratio is reported as a function of the average charged particle multiplicity at different center-of-mass energies.

The production cross sections for prompt charmed mesons [equation], [equation], [equation] and [equation] were measured at mid-rapidity in proton–proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy [equation]...

The azimuthal anisotropy coefficient $v_2$ of prompt $D^0$, $D^{+}$, $D^{*+}$, and $D_s^{+}$ mesons was measured in midcentral (30%–50% centrality class) Pb-Pb collisions at a center-of-mass energy per nucleon pair $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=5.02\mathrm{TeV}$, with the ALICE detector at the LHC. The $D$ mesons were reconstructed via their hadronic decays at midrapidity, $|y|<0.8$, in the transverse momentum interval $1<p_T<24\mathrm{GeV}/c$. The measured $D$-meson $v_2$ has similar values as that of charged pions. The $D_s^{+}$ $v_2$, measured for the first time, is found to be compatible with that of nonstrange $D$ mesons. The measurements are compared with theoretical calculations of charm-quark transport in a hydrodynamically expanding medium and have the potential to constrain medium parameters.