Particle production at the SPS and the QCD phase diagram

Abstract

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.