Hadron production in heavy ion collisions: Fragmentation and recombination from a dense parton phase

We discuss hadron production in heavy ion collisions at RHIC. We argue that hadrons at transverse momenta P_T < 5 GeV are formed by recombination of partons from the dense parton phase created in central collisions at RHIC. We provide a theoretical description of the recombination process for P_T > 2 GeV. Below P_T = 2 GeV our results smoothly match a purely statistical description. At high transverse momentum hadron production is well described in the language of perturbative QCD by the fragmentation of partons. We give numerical results for a variety of hadron spectra, ratios and nuclear suppression factors. We also discuss the anisotropic flow v_2 and give results based on a flow in the parton phase. Our results are consistent with the existence of a parton phase at RHIC hadronizing at a temperature of 175 MeV and a radial flow velocity of 0.55c.Comment: 25 pages LaTeX, 18 figures; v2: some references updated; v3: some typos fixe

Bohr's 1913 molecular model revisited

It is generally believed that the old quantum theory, as presented by Niels Bohr in 1913, fails when applied to few electron systems, such as the H2 molecule. Here we find new solutions within the Bohr theory that describe the potential energy curve for the lowest singlet and triplet states of H2 about as well as the early wave mechanical treatment of Heitler and London. We also develop a new interpolation scheme which substantially improves the agreement with the exact ground state potential curve of H2 and provides a good description of more complicated molecules such as LiH, Li2, BeH and He2.Comment: 6 pages, 9 figure

Ambiguities in statistical calculations of nuclear fragmentation

The concept of freeze out volume used in many statistical approaches for disassembly of hot nuclei leads to ambiguities. The fragmentation pattern and the momentum distribution (temperature) of the emanated fragments are determined by the phase space at the freeze-out volume where the interaction among the fragments is supposedly frozen out. However, to get coherence with the experimental momentum distribution of the charged particles, one introduces Coulomb acceleration beyond this freeze-out. To be consistent, we investigate the effect of the attractive nuclear force beyond this volume and find that the possible recombination of the fragments alters the physical observables significantly casting doubt on the consistency of the statistical model.Comment: 11 pages+3 figure

Direct Observation of Interband Spin-Orbit Coupling in a Two-Dimensional Electron System

We report the direct observation of interband spin-orbit (SO) coupling in a two-dimensional (2D) surface electron system, in addition to the anticipated Rashba spin splitting. Using angle-resolved photoemission experiments and first-principles calculations on Bi/Ag/Au heterostructures we show that the effect strongly modifies the dispersion as well as the orbital and spin character of the 2D electronic states, thus giving rise to considerable deviations from the Rashba model. The strength of the interband SO coupling is tuned by the thickness of the thin film structures

Dynamics of Oscillators Coupled by a Medium with Adaptive Impact

In this article we study the dynamics of coupled oscillators. We use mechanical metronomes that are placed over a rigid base. The base moves by a motor in a one-dimensional direction and the movements of the base follow some functions of the phases of the metronomes (in other words, it is controlled to move according to a provided function). Because of the motor and the feedback, the phases of the metronomes affect the movements of the base while on the other hand, when the base moves, it affects the phases of the metronomes in return. For a simple function for the base movement (such as $y = \gamma_{x} [r \theta_1 + (1 - r) \theta_2]$ in which $y$ is the velocity of the base, $\gamma_{x}$ is a multiplier, $r$ is a proportion and $\theta_1$ and $\theta_2$ are phases of the metronomes), we show the effects on the dynamics of the oscillators. Then we study how this function changes in time when its parameters adapt by a feedback. By numerical simulations and experimental tests, we show that the dynamic of the set of oscillators and the base tends to evolve towards a certain region. This region is close to a transition in dynamics of the oscillators; where more frequencies start to appear in the frequency spectra of the phases of the metronomes

Flipping SU(5) out of Trouble

Minimal supersymmetric SU(5) GUTs are being squeezed by the recent values of alpha_s, sin^2 theta_W, the lower limit on the lifetime for p to nubar K decay, and other experimental data. We show how the minimal flipped SU(5) GUT survives these perils, accommodating the experimental values of alpha_s and sin^2 theta_W and other constraints, while yielding a p to e/mu+ pi0 lifetime beyond the present experimental limit but potentially accessible to a further round of experiments. We exemplify our analysis using a set of benchmark supersymmetric scenarios proposed recently in a constrained MSSM framework.Comment: 12 pages LaTex, 3 eps figure

Parton energy loss limits and shadowing in Drell-Yan dimuon production

A precise measurement of the ratios of the Drell-Yan cross section per nucleon for an 800 GeV/c proton beam incident on Be, Fe and W targets is reported. The behavior of the Drell-Yan ratios at small target parton momentum fraction is well described by an existing fit to the shadowing observed in deep-inelastic scattering. The cross section ratios as a function of the incident parton momentum fraction set tight limits on the energy loss of quarks passing through a cold nucleus

Detection of SUSY in the Stau-Neutralino Coannihilation Region at the LHC

We study the feasibility of detecting the stau neutralino (stau_1-neutralino_1)coannihilation region at the LHC using tau leptons. The signal is characterized by multiple low energy tau leptons from neutralino_2-->tau stau_1-->tau tau neutralino_1 decays, where the stau_1 and neutralino_1 mass difference (Delta M) is constrained to be 5-15 GeV by current experimental bounds including the bound on the amount of neutralino cold dark matter. Within the framework of minimal supergravity models, we show that if hadronically decaying tau's can be identified with 50% efficiency for visible pt >20 GeV the observation of such signals is possible in the final state of two tau leptons plus large missing energy and two jets. With a gluino mass of 830 GeV the signal can be observed with as few as 3-10 fb^-1 of data (depending on the size of Delta M). Using a mass measurement of the tau pairs with 10 fb^-1 we can determine dM with a statistical uncertainty of 12% for Delta M = 10 GeV and an additional systematic uncertainty of 14% if the gluino mass has an uncertainty of 5%.Comment: 15 pages. 9 Figures, Latex, Typing error in the title as it appeared in the web listing is corrected, paper is unchange

A new scenario for string unification

We present a new scenario for gauge coupling unification in flipped SU(5) string models, which identifies the $M_{32}$ scale of SU(3) and SU(2) unification with the empirical $M_{\rm LEP}\sim10^{15-16}$~GeV scale, and the $M_{51}$ scale of SU(5) and U(1) unification with the theoretical $M_{\rm string}\sim5\times10^{17}$~GeV string unification scale. The vacuum shift necessary for the cancellation of the anomalous $\rm U_A(1)$ and an SU(4) hidden sector with fractionally-charged particles, play a crucial role in the dynamical determination of all intermediate mass scales in this scenario.Comment: 8 pages, LaTeX, 2 figures (uuencoded

Gravitational GUT Breaking and the GUT-Planck Hierarchy

It is shown that non-renormalizable gravitational interactions in the Higgs sector of supersymmetric grand unified theories (GUT's) can produce the breaking of the unifying gauge group $G$ at the GUT scale $M_{\rm GUT} \sim 10^{16}$~GeV. Such a breaking offers an attractive alternative to the traditional method where the superheavy GUT scale mass parameters are added ad hoc into the theory. The mechanism also offers a natural explanation for the closeness of the GUT breaking scale to the Planck scale. A study of the minimal SU(5) model endowed with this mechanism is presented and shown to be phenomenologically viable. A second model is examined where the Higgs doublets are kept naturally light as Goldstone modes. This latter model also achieves breaking of $G$ at $M_{\rm GUT}$ but cannot easily satisfy the current experimental proton decay bound.Comment: 11 pages, REVTeX, 1 figure included as an uuencoded Z-compressed PostScript file. Our Web page at http://physics.tamu.edu/~urano/research/gutplanck.html contains ready to print PostScript version (with figures) as well as color version of plot