Strangeness production in antiproton-nucleus annihilation

The results of the microscopic transport calculations of $\bar p$-nucleus interactions within a GiBUU model are presented. The dominating mechanism of hyperon production is the strangeness exchange processes $\bar K N \to Y \pi$ and $\bar K N \to \Xi K$. The calculated rapidity spectra of $\Xi$ hyperons are significantly shifted to forward rapidities with respect to the spectra of $S=-1$ hyperons. We argue that this shift should be a sensitive test for the possible exotic mechanisms of $\bar p$-nucleus annihilation. The production of the double $\Lambda$-hypernuclei by $\Xi^-$ interaction with a secondary target is calculated.Comment: Proceedings of the 12th Int. Workshop on Meson Production, Properties and Interaction (MESON-2012), Cracow, 31.05-05.06.201

Strongly damped nuclear collisions: zero or first sound ?

The relaxation of the collective quadrupole motion in the initial stage of a central heavy ion collision at beam energies $E_{lab}=5\div20$ AMeV is studied within a microscopic kinetic transport model. The damping rate is shown to be a non-monotonic function of E_{lab} for a given pair of colliding nuclei. This fact is interpreted as a manifestation of the zero-to-first sound transition in a finite nuclear system.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure

Multifragmentation of charge asymmetric nuclear systems

The multifragmentation of excited spherical nuclear sources with various N/Z ratios and fixed mass number is studied within dynamical and statistical models. The dynamical model treats the multifragmentation process as a final stage of the growth of density fluctuations in unstable expanding nuclear matter. The statistical model makes a choice of the final multifragment configuration according to its statistical weight at a global thermal equilibrium. Similarities and differences in the predictions of the two models on the isotopic composition of the produced fragments are presented and the most sensitive observable characteristics are discussed.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figure

Transfer of synthetic human chromosome into human induced pluripotent stem cells for biomedical applications

Alphoid(tetO)-type human artificial chromosome (HAC) has been recently synthetized as a novel class of gene delivery vectors for induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-based tissue replacement therapeutic approach. This HAC vector was designed to deliver copies of genes into patients with genetic diseases caused by the loss of a particular gene function. The alphoid(tetO)-HAC vector has been successfully transferred into murine embryonic stem cells (ESCs) and maintained stably as an independent chromosome during the proliferation and differentiation of these cells. Human ESCs and iPSCs have significant differences in culturing conditions and pluripotency state in comparison with the murine naïve-type ESCs and iPSCs. To date, transferring alphoid(tetO)-HAC vector into human iPSCs (hiPSCs) remains a challenging task. In this study, we performed the microcell-mediated chromosome transfer (MMCT) of alphoid(tetO)-HAC expressing the green fluorescent protein into newly generated hiPSCs. We used a recently modified MMCT method that employs an envelope protein of amphotropic murine leukemia virus as a targeting cell fusion agent. Our data provide evidence that a totally artificial vector, alphoid(tetO)-HAC, can be transferred and maintained in human iPSCs as an independent autonomous chromosome without affecting pluripotent properties of the cells. These data also open new perspectives for implementing alphoid(tetO)-HAC as a gene therapy tool in future biomedical applications

Formation of double-Λ\Lambda hypernuclei at PANDA

We study the formation of single- and double-$\Lambda$ hypernuclei in antiproton-induced reactions relevant for the forthcoming PANDA experiment at FAIR. We use the Giessen Boltzmann-Uehling-Uhlenbeck (GiBUU) transport model with relativistic mean-fields for the description of non-equilibrium dynamics and the statistical multifragmentation model (SMM) for fragment formation. This combined approach describes the dynamical properties of strangeness and fragments in low energy $\bar{p}$-induced reactions fairly well. We then focus on the formation of double-$\Lambda$ hypernuclei in high energy $\bar{p}$-nucleus collisions on a primary target including the complementary $\Xi$-induced reactions to a secondary one, as proposed by the PANDA collaboration. Our results show that a copious production of double-$\Lambda$ hyperfragments is possible at PANDA. In particular, we provide first theoretical estimations on the double-$\Lambda$ production cross section, which strongly rises with decreasing energy of the secondary $\Xi$-beam.Comment: 20 pages, 11 figures, Nuclear Physics A, in pres

Shear Viscosity of a Hot Pion Gas

The shear viscosity of an interacting pion gas is studied using the Kubo formalism as a microscopic description of thermal systems close to global equilibrium. We implement the skeleton expansion in order to approximate the retarded correlator of the viscous part of the energy-momentum tensor. After exploring this in $g\phi^4$ theory we show how the skeleton expansion can be consistently applied to pions in chiral perturbation theory. The shear viscosity $\eta$ is determined by the spectral width, or equivalently, the mean free path of pions in the heat bath. We derive a new analytical result for the mean free path which is well-conditioned for numerical evaluation and discuss the temperature and pion-mass dependence of the mean free path and the shear viscosity. The ratio $\eta/s$ of the interacting pion gas exceeds the lower bound $1/4\pi$ from AdS/CFT correspondence.Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures. Revision includes additional Appendix B. Matches published versio

Thermal analysis of production of resonances in relativistic heavy-ion collisions

Production of resonances is considered in the framework of the single-freeze-out model of ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions. The formalism involves the virial expansion, where the probability to form a resonance in a two-body channel is proportional to the derivative of the phase-shift with respect to the invariant mass. The thermal model incorporates longitudinal and transverse flow, as well as kinematic cuts of the STAR experiment at RHIC. We find that the shape of the pi+ pi- spectral line qualitatively reproduces the preliminary experimental data when the position of the rho peak is lowered. This confirms the need to include the medium effects in the description of the RHIC data. We also analyze the transverse-momentum spectra of rho, K*(892), and f_0(980), and find that the slopes agree with the observed values. Predictions are made for eta, eta', omega, phi, Lambda(1520), and Sigma(1385).Comment: minor modifications, a reference adde

Rapidity distribution as a probe for elliptical flow at intermediate energies

Interplay between the spectator and participant matter in heavy-ion collisions is investigated within isospin dependent quantum molecular dynamics (IQMD) model in term of rapidity distribution of light charged particles. The effect of different types and size rapidity distributions is studied in elliptical flow. The elliptical flow patterns show important role of the nearby spectator matter on the participant zone. This role is further explained on the basis of passing time of the spectator and expansion time of the participant zone. The transition from the in-plane to out-of-plane is observed only when the mid-rapidity region is included in the rapidity bin, otherwise no transition occurs. The transition energy is found to be highly sensitive towards the size of the rapidity bin, while weakly on the type of the rapidity distribution. The theoretical results are also compared with the experimental findings and are found in good agreement.Comment: 8 figure

Hadronic observables from SIS to SPS energies - anything strange with strangeness ?

We calculate $p, \pi^\pm, K^\pm$ and $\Lambda$(+$\Sigma^0$) rapidity distributions and compare to experimental data from SIS to SPS energies within the UrQMD and HSD transport approaches that are both based on string, quark, diquark ($q, \bar{q}, qq, \bar{q}\bar{q}$) and hadronic degrees of freedom. The two transport models do not include any explicit phase transition to a quark-gluon plasma (QGP). It is found that both approaches agree rather well with each other and with the experimental rapidity distributions for protons, $\Lambda$'s, $\pi^\pm$ and $K^\pm$. Inspite of this apparent agreement both transport models fail to reproduce the maximum in the excitation function for the ratio $K^+/\pi^+$ found experimentally between 11 and 40 A$\cdot$GeV. A comparison to the various experimental data shows that this 'failure' is dominantly due to an insufficient description of pion rapidity distributions rather than missing 'strangeness'. The modest differences in the transport model results -- on the other hand -- can be attributed to different implementations of string formation and fragmentation, that are not sufficiently controlled by experimental data for the 'elementary' reactions in vacuum.Comment: 46 pages, including 15 eps figures, to be published in Phys. Rev.

Dilepton production in heavy ion collisions at intermediate energies

We present a unified description of the vector meson and dilepton production in elementary and in heavy ion reactions. The production of vector mesons ($\rho,\omega$) is described via the excitation of nuclear resonances ($R$). The theoretical framework is an extended vector meson dominance model (eVMD). The treatment of the resonance decays $R\longmapsto NV$ with arbitrary spin is covariant and kinematically complete. The eVMD includes thereby excited vector meson states in the transition form factors. This ensures correct asymptotics and provides a unified description of photonic and mesonic decays. The resonance model is successfully applied to the $\omega$ production in $p+p$ reactions. The same model is applied to the dilepton production in elementary reactions ($p+p, p+d$). Corresponding data are well reproduced. However, when the model is applied to heavy ion reactions in the BEVALAC/SIS energy range the experimental dilepton spectra measured by the DLS Collaboration are significantly underestimated at small invariant masses. As a possible solution of this problem the destruction of quantum interference in a dense medium is discussed. A decoherent emission through vector mesons decays enhances the corresponding dilepton yield in heavy ion reactions. In the vicinity of the $\rho/\omega$-peak the reproduction of the data requires further a substantial collisional broadening of the $\rho$ and in particular of the $\omega$ meson.Comment: 32 pages revtex, 19 figures, to appear in PR