1,107 research outputs found
A percolation transition in Yang-Mills matter at finite number of colours
We examine baryonic matter at quark chemical potential of the order of the
confinement scale, \mu_q\sim \lqcd. In this regime, quarks are supposed to be
confined but baryons are close to the ``tightly packed limit'' where they
nearly overlap in configuration space. We show that this system will exhibit a
percolation phase transition {\em when varied in the number of colours} :
at high , large distance correlations at quark level are possible even if
the quarks are essentially confined. At low , this does not happen. We
discuss the relevance of this for dense nuclear matter, and argue that our
results suggest a new ``phase transition'', varying at constant .Comment: Accepted for publication, Physical Review Letters. Title changed from
original, "Quarkyonic percolation at finite number of colors", at the request
of the edito
Rise of azimuthal anisotropies as a signature of the Quark-Gluon-Plasma in relativistic heavy-ion collisions
The azimuthal anisotropies of the collective transverse flow of hadrons are
investigated in a large range of heavy-ion collision energy within the
Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) microscopic transport approach which
incorporates explicit partonic degrees of freedom in terms of strongly
interacting quasiparticles (quarks and gluons) in line with an
equation-of-state from lattice QCD as well as dynamical hadronization and
hadronic dynamics in the final reaction phase. The experimentally observed
increase of the elliptic flow with bombarding energy is successfully
described in terms of the PHSD approach in contrast to a variety of other
kinetic models based on hadronic interactions. The analysis of higher-order
harmonics and shows a similar tendency of growing deviations
between partonic and purely hadronic models with increasing bombarding energy.
This signals that the excitation functions of azimuthal anisotropies provide a
sensitive probe for the underling degrees of freedom excited in heavy-ion
collisions.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, title change
Charged Particle Production in Proton-, Deuteron-, Oxygen- and Sulphur-Nucleus Collisions at 200 GeV per Nucleon
The transverse momentum and rapidity distributions of net protons and
negatively charged hadrons have been measured for minimum bias proton-nucleus
and deuteron-gold interactions, as well as central oxygen-gold and
sulphur-nucleus collisions at 200 GeV per nucleon. The rapidity density of net
protons at midrapidity in central nucleus-nucleus collisions increases both
with target mass for sulphur projectiles and with the projectile mass for a
gold target. The shape of the rapidity distributions of net protons forward of
midrapidity for d+Au and central S+Au collisions is similar. The average
rapidity loss is larger than 2 units of rapidity for reactions with the gold
target. The transverse momentum spectra of net protons for all reactions can be
described by a thermal distribution with `temperatures' between 145 +- 11 MeV
(p+S interactions) and 244 +- 43 MeV (central S+Au collisions). The
multiplicity of negatively charged hadrons increases with the mass of the
colliding system. The shape of the transverse momentum spectra of negatively
charged hadrons changes from minimum bias p+p and p+S interactions to p+Au and
central nucleus-nucleus collisions. The mean transverse momentum is almost
constant in the vicinity of midrapidity and shows little variation with the
target and projectile masses. The average number of produced negatively charged
hadrons per participant baryon increases slightly from p+p, p+A to central
S+S,Ag collisions.Comment: 47 pages, submitted to Z. Phys.
Medium effects in high energy heavy-ion collisions
The change of hadron properties in dense matter based on various theoretical
approaches are reviewed. Incorporating these medium effects in the relativistic
transport model, which treats consistently the change of hadron masses and
energies in dense matter via the scalar and vector fields, heavy-ion collisions
at energies available from SIS/GSI, AGS/BNL, and SPS/CERN are studied. This
model is seen to provide satisfactory explanations for the observed enhancement
of kaon, antikaon, and antiproton yields as well as soft pions in the
transverse direction from the SIS experiments. In the AGS heavy-ion
experiments, it can account for the enhanced ratio, the difference
in the slope parameters of the and transverse kinetic energy
spectra, and the lower apparent temperature of antiprotons than that of
protons. This model also provides possible explanations for the observed
enhancement of low-mass dileptons, phi mesons, and antilambdas in heavy-ion
collisions at SPS energies. Furthermore, the change of hadron properties in hot
dense matter leads to new signatures of the quark-gluon plasma to hadronic
matter transition in future ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions at RHIC/BNL.Comment: RevTeX, 65 pages, including 25 postscript figures, invited topical
review for Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physic
Near-threshold production of the multi-strange hyperon
The yield for the multi-strange hyperon has been measured in 6 AGeV
Au+Au collisions via reconstruction of its decay products and
, the latter also being reconstructed from its daughter tracks of
and p. The measurement is rather close to the threshold for
production and therefore provides an important test of model predictions. The
measured yield for and are compared for several
centralities. In central collisions the yield is found to be in
excellent agreement with statistical and transport model predictions,
suggesting that multi-strange hadron production approaches chemical equilibrium
in high baryon density nuclear matter.Comment: Submitted to PR
Comparison of Source Images for protons, 's and 's in 6 AGeV Au+Au collisions
Source images are extracted from two-particle correlations constructed from
strange and non-strange hadrons produced in 6 AGeV Au + Au collisions. Very
different source images result from pp vs p vs
correlations. These observations suggest important differences in the
space-time emission histories for protons, pions and neutral strange baryons
produced in the same events
Longitudinal Flow of Protons from 2-8 AGeV Central Au+Au Collisions
Rapidity distributions of protons from central Au + Au
collisions measured by the E895 Collaboration in the energy range from 2 to 8
AGeV at the Brookhaven AGS are presented. Longitudinal flow parameters derived
using a thermal model including collective longitudinal expansion are extracted
from these distributions. The results show an approximately linear increase in
the longitudinal flow velocity, , as a function of the
logarithm of beam energy.Comment: 5 Pages, including 3 figures, 1 tabl
Laying the groundwork at the AGS: Recent results from experiment E895
The E895 Collaboration at the Brookhaven AGS has performed a systematic
investigation of Au+Au collisions at 2-8 AGeV, using a large-acceptance Time
Projection Chamber. In addition to extensive measurements of particle flow,
spectra, two-particle interferometry, and strangeness production, we have
performed novel hybrid analyses, including azimuthally-sensitive pion HBT,
extraction of the six-dimensional pion phasespace density, and a first
measurement of the Lambda-proton correlation function.Comment: Presented at Quark Matter 2001, 8 pages, 5 figure
Charged Pion Production in 2 to 8 AGeV Central Au+Au Collisions
Momentum spectra of charged pions over nearly full rapidity coverage from
target to beam rapidity have been measured in the 0-5% most central Au+Au
collisions in the beam energy range from 2 to 8 AGeV by the E895 Experiment.
Using a thermal parameterization to fit the transverse mass spectra, rapidity
density distributions are extracted. The observed spectra are compared with
predictions from the RQMD v2.3 cascade model and also to a thermal model
including longitudinal flow. The total 4 yields of the charged pions are
used to infer an initial state entropy produced in the collisions.Comment: 13 pgs, 19 figs, accepted by Phys. Rev. C. Data tables available at
http://nuclear.ucdavis.edu/~e895/published_spectra.htm
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