Dilepton production from the quark-gluon plasma using (3+1)-dimensional anisotropic dissipative hydrodynamics

Abstract

We compute dilepton production from the deconfined phase of the quark-gluon plasma using leading-order ($3+1$)-dimensional anisotropic hydrodynamics. The anisotropic hydrodynamics equations employed describe the full spatiotemporal evolution of the transverse temperature, spheroidal momentum-space anisotropy parameter, and the associated three-dimensional collective flow of the matter. The momentum-space anisotropy is also taken into account in the computation of the dilepton production rate, allowing for a self-consistent description of dilepton production from the quark-gluon plasma. For our final results, we present predictions for high-energy dilepton yields as a function of invariant mass, transverse momentum, and pair rapidity. We demonstrate that high-energy dilepton production is extremely sensitive to the assumed level of initial momentum-space anisotropy of the quark-gluon plasma. As a result, it may be possible to experimentally constrain the early-time momentum-space anisotropy of the quark-gluon plasma generated in relativistic heavy-ion collisions using high-energy dilepton yields.