Particle Production at the SPS and the QCD Phase Diagram

Recent results of particle production in the energy regime of the CERN-SPS are reviewed. In order to collect information on the properties of the QCD phase diagram systematic studies of the system size and the energy dependence of particle production in heavy ion collisions have been performed. Net-baryon distributions and results on strangeness production are discussed. The system size dependence of many observables can be understood in the core-corona approach, which has implications on the possibility to use system size as a control parameter to study different areas of the phase diagram. Recent attempts to search for a critical point, such as multiplicity fluctuations and the transverse mass dependence of anti-baryon/baryon ratios are reviewed.Comment: Proccedings of 26th Winter Workshop on Nuclear Dynamics, 9 pages, 7 figure

Strangeness from 20 AGeV to 158 AGeV

New results from the energy scan programme of NA49, in particular kaon production at 30 AGeV and phi production at 40 and 80 AGeV are presented. The K+/pi+ ratio shows a pronounced maximum at 30 AGeV; the kaon slope parameters are constant at SPS energies. Both findings support the scenario of a phase transition at about 30 AGeV beam energy. The phi/pi ratio increases smoothly with beam energy, showing an energy dependence similar to K-/pi-. The measured particle yields can be reproduced by a hadron gas model, with chemical freeze-out parameters on a smooth curve in the T-muB plane. The transverse spectra can be understood as resulting from a rapidly expanding, locally equilibrated source. No evidence for an earlier kinetic decoupling of heavy hyperons is found.Comment: Contribution to the proceedings of "Strangeness in Quark Matter 2003" (March 2003, Atlantic Beach NC, USA), to be published in Journal of Physics G. 11 pages, 14 figure

Hadron production in nuclear collisions from the NA49 experiment at 158GeV/c · A

With its large acceptance and particle identification coverage the NA49 experiment (Fig. 1) can study hadron production in a wide range of high energy reactions [1]. Originally aimed at examining central Pb+Pb collisions for signatures of quark-gluon plasma formation, the scope of the experiment has been enhanced with a systematic study of impact parameter and projectile size dependence, as well as the inclusion of the more elementary p+p and p+A interactions. The question is: are predicted signals of the quark-gluon plasma observed and are there discontinuities which would support the concept of hadronic phase transition

Centrality dependence of directed and elliptic flow at the SPS

New data with a minimum bias trigger for 158 GeV/nucleon Pb + Pb have been analyzed. Directed and elliptic flow as a function of rapidity of the particles and centrality of the collision are presented. The centrality dependence of the ratio of elliptic flow to the initial space elliptic anisotropy is compared to models

Production of multi-strange hyperons and strange resonances in the NA49 experiment

The NA49 large-acceptance hadron spectrometer has measured strange and multi-strange hadrons from Pb + Pb and p + p collisions at the CERN SPS. Preliminary results for the transverse mass and rapidity distributions for - and + from central Pb + Pb collisions at 158 GeV c-1/nucleon are presented. Fully integrated yields per event of 4.42± 0.31 and 0.74± 0.04 are found for - and +, respectively, leading to a 4π +/- ratio of 0.17± 0.02. The ratio +/- at mid-rapidity is found to be 0.22 ± 0.04, agreeing with previously published values. In addition, preliminary data on the ∧(1520) and φ(1020) resonances are presented. The ∧(1520) multiplicity for p + p collisions is found to be 0.012 ± 0.003. No signal is observed for Pb + Pb collisions and a production upper limit of 1.36 ∧(1520) per event indicates an apparent suppression when comparing with scaled p + p data. Integrated φ(1020) yields per event are found to be 7.6 ± 1.1 for Pb + Pb and 0.012 ± 0.0015 for p + p collisions. No significant shift or broadening of the φ(1020) invariant mass distribution is observed in central Pb + Pb collisions. © 2001 IOP Publishing Ltd