Quarkonium states in an anisotropic QCD plasma

We consider quarkonium in a hot QCD plasma which, due to expansion and non-zero viscosity, exhibits a local anisotropy in momentum space. At short distances the heavy-quark potential is known at tree level from the hard-thermal loop resummed gluon propagator in anisotropic perturbative QCD. The potential at long distances is modeled as a QCD string which is screened at the same scale as the Coulomb field. At asymptotic separation the potential energy is non-zero and inversely proportional to the temperature. We obtain numerical solutions of the three-dimensional Schroedinger equation for this potential. We find that quarkonium binding is stronger at non-vanishing viscosity and expansion rate, and that the anisotropy leads to polarization of the P-wave states.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figures, final version, to appear in PR

Explosive Decomposition in Ultrarelativistic Heavy Ion Collision

Recent results from Au+Au collisions at BNL-RHIC energy hint at explosive hadron production at the QCD transition rather than soft hydrodynamic evolution. We speculate that this is due to a rapid variation of the effective potential for QCD close to Tc. Performing real-time lattice simulations of an effective theory we show that the fast evolution of the potential leads to ``explosive'' spinodal decomposition rather than bubble nucleation or critical slowing down

Forward particle productions at RHIC and the LHC from CGC within local rcBK evolution

In order to describe forward hadron productions in high-energy nuclear collisions, we propose a Monte-Carlo implementation of Dumitru-Hayashigaki-Jalilian-Marian formula with the unintegrated gluon distribution obtained numerically from the running-coupling BK equation. We discuss influence of initial conditions for the BK equation by comparing a model constrained by global fit of small-x HERA data and a newly proposed one from the running coupling MV model.Comment: Talk given at conference Quark Matter 2011, 4 page

Two-point functions for SU(3) Polyakov Loops near T_c

We discuss the behavior of two point functions for Polyakov loops in a SU(3) gauge theory about the critical temperature, T_c. From a Z(3) model, in mean field theory we obtain a prediction for the ratio of masses at T_c, extracted from correlation functions for the imaginary and real parts of the Polyakov loop. This ratio is m_i/m_r = 3 if the potential only includes terms up to quartic order in the Polyakov loop; its value changes as pentic and hexatic interactions become important. The Polyakov Loop Model then predicts how m_i/m_r changes above T_c.Comment: 5 pages, no figures; reference adde

Hydrodynamic Models for Heavy-Ion Collisions, and beyond

A generic property of a first-order phase transition in equilibrium, and in the limit of large entropy per unit of conserved charge, is the smallness of the isentropic speed of sound in the ``mixed phase''. A specific prediction is that this should lead to a non-isotropic momentum distribution of nucleons in the reaction plane (for energies around 40 AGeV in our model calculation). On the other hand, we show that from present effective theories for low-energy QCD one does not expect the thermal transition rate between various states of the effective potential to be much larger than the expansion rate, questioning the applicability of the idealized Maxwell/Gibbs construction. Experimental data could soon provide essential information on the dynamics of the phase transition.Comment: 10 Pages, 4 Figures. Presented at 241st WE-Heraeus Seminar: Symposium on Fundamental Issues in Elementary Matter: In Honor and Memory of Michael Danos, Bad Honnef, Germany, 25-29 Sep 200

Screening of heavy quark free energies at finite temperature and non-zero baryon chemical potential

We analyze the dependence of heavy quark free energies on the baryon chemical potential (mu_b) in 2-flavour QCD using improved (p4) staggered fermions with a bare quark mass of m/T = 0.4. By performing a 6th order Taylor expansion in the chemical potential which circumvents the sign problem. The Taylor expansion coefficients of colour singlet and colour averaged free energies are calculated and from this the expansion coefficients for the corresponding screening masses are determined. We find that for small mu_b the free energies of a static quark anti-quark pair decrease in a medium with a net excess of quarks and that screening is well described by a screening mass which increases with increasing mu_b. The mu_b-dependent corrections to the screening masses are well described by perturbation theory for T > 2 T_c. In particular, we find for all temperatures above T_c that the expansion coefficients for singlet and colour averaged screening masses differ by a factor 2.Comment: 14 page

The K/pi ratio from condensed Polyakov loops

We perform a field-theoretical computation of hadron production in large systems at the QCD confinement phase transition associated with restoration of the Z(3) global symmetry. This occurs from the decay of a condensate for the Polyakov loop. From the effective potential for the Polyakov loop, its mass just below the confinement temperature T_c is in between the vacuum masses of the pion and that of the kaon. Therefore, due to phase-space restrictions the number of produced kaons is roughly an order of magnitude smaller than that of produced pions, in agreement with recent results from collisions of gold ions at the BNL-RHIC. From its mass, we estimate that the Polyakov loop condensate is characterized by a (spatial) correlation scale of 1/m_\ell ~ 1/2 fm. For systems of deconfined matter of about that size, the free energy may not be dominated by a condensate for the Polyakov loop, and so the process of hadronization may be qualitatively different as compared to large systems. In that vein, experimental data on hadron abundance ratios, for example K/pi, in high-multiplicity pp events at high energies should be very interesting.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures; discussion of the two-point function of Polyakov Loops in small versus large systems adde

Dense Quarks, and the Fermion Sign Problem, in a SU(N) Matrix Model

We study the effect of dense quarks in a SU(N) matrix model of deconfinement. For three or more colors, the quark contribution to the loop potential is complex. After adding the charge conjugate loop, the measure of the matrix integral is real, but not positive definite. In a matrix model, quarks act like a background Z(N) field; at nonzero density, the background field also has an imaginary part, proportional to the imaginary part of the loop. Consequently, while the expectation values of the loop and its complex conjugate are both real, they are not equal. These results suggest a possible approach to the fermion sign problem in lattice QCD.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figure

Magnetic Characterization of Nanocrystalline Nickel Ferrite Films Processed by a Spin-Spraying Method

Highly crystalline nickel ferrite films with different chemical compositions were processed via the spin-spraying method and their morphological, structural and magnetic properties were subsequently investigated. Regardless of the chemical composition, films with variable thicknesses are constructed by 200–400 nm spherical grains grown in the direction normal to the substrate surface. Magnetization measurements show that the spinel ferrite films present a hysteretic behaviour at room temperature with a randomly oriented in-plane easy axis and an anisotropy constant K1 ≈ −2.5 × 104 erg cm−3 Furthermore, the absence of an angular dependence of the coercivity for the in-plane measurement of magnetization coupled with the ‘M’-shaped angular dependence of the out-of-plane measurement, indicates that the anisotropy of this film is predominantly crystalline shape anisotropy