Hot QCD Research Articles

Perturbative renormalization of the electric field correlator

The momentum diffusion coefficient of a heavy quark in a hot QCD plasma can be extracted as a transport coefficient related to the correlator of two colour-electric fields dressing a Polyakov loop. We determine the perturbative renormalization factor for a particular lattice discretization of this correlator within Wilson's SU(3) gauge theory, finding a ~12% NLO correction for values of the bare coupling used in the current generation of simulations. The impact of this result on existing lattice determinations is commented upon, and a possibility for non-perturbative renormalization through the gradient flow is pointed out.

Inclusive reconstruction of hadron resonances in elementary and heavy-ion collisions with HADES

The unambiguous identification of hadron modifications in hot and dense QCD matter is one of the important goals in nuclear physics. In the regime of 1 - 2 GeV kinetic energy per nucleon, HADES has measured rare and penetrating probes in elementary and heavy-ion collisions. The main creation mechanism of mesons is the excitation and decay of baryonic resonances throughout the fireball evolution. The reconstruction of shortlived (≈ 1 fm/c) resonance states through their decay products is notoriously difficult. We have developed a new iterative algorithm, which builds the best hypothesis of signal and background by distortion of individual particle properties. This allows to extract signals with signal-to-background ratios of <1%.

Light flavour hadron production in the ALICE experiment at LHC

Unique among the LHC experiments, ALICE has excellent particle identification capabilities for the measurement of light-flavour hadrons. A large number of hadron species from pions to multi-strange baryons and light nuclei have been measured over a large transverse momentum region. The measurement of the production of these particles is a valuable tool to study the properties of the medium formed in heavy-ion collisions. In particular they give information on the collective phenomena of the fireball, on the parton energy loss in the hot QCD medium and on the hadronization mechanisms such as recombination and statistical hadronization. The measurements in pp and in p-nucleus collisions provide the necessary baseline for heavy-ion data and help to investigate the effects of the ordinary nuclear matter. In this paper some of the main ALICE results on identified light-flavour hadron production in Pb–Pb collisions at √s NN = 2.76 TeV and p–Pb collisions at √s NN = 5.02 TeV will be presented.

Quark Loop Contribution to the Gluon Damping Rate in Hot QCD**Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos 11465021 and 11065010.

The contribution of the quark loop to the gluon damping rate at zero momentum is calculated using the effective perturbative expansion technique developed by Braaten and Pisarski. It is shown that in the temperature range accessible in the present heavy-ion experiments, the contribution of the quark loop can not be ignored. The numerical results show that the quark loop provides an apparent contribution to the gluon damping rate at temperatures of experimental interest.

Quark and gluon distribution functions in a viscous quark-gluon plasma medium and dilepton production viaqq¯annihilation

Viscous modifications to the thermal distributions of quark-antiquarks and gluons have been studied in a quasi-particle description of the quark-gluon-plasma medium created in relativistic heavy ion collision experiments. The model is described in terms of quasi-partons that encode the hot QCD medium effects in their respective effective fugacities. Both shear and bulk viscosities have been taken in to account in the analysis and the modifications to thermal distributions have been obtained by modifying the the energy momentum tensor in view of the non-trivial dispersion relations for the gluons and quarks. As an implication, dilepton production rate in the $q \bar{q}$ annihilation process has been investigated. Significant modifications have been observed in the dilepton production rate in the presence of interactions encoded in the QCD equation of state.

Finite coupling corrections to holographic predictions for hot QCD

Finite 't Hooft coupling corrections to multiple physical observables in strongly coupled $N=4$ supersymmetric Yang-Mills plasma are examined, in an attempt to assess the stability of the expansion in inverse powers of the 't Hooft coupling $\lambda$. Observables considered include thermodynamic quantities, transport coefficients, and quasinormal mode frequencies. Although large $\lambda$ expansions for quasinormal mode frequencies are notably less well behaved than the expansions of other quantities, we find that a partial resummation of higher order corrections can significantly reduce the sensitivity of the results to the value of $\lambda$.

Debye screening mass of hot Yang-Mills theory to three-loop order

Building upon our earlier work, we compute a Debye mass of finite-temperature Yang-Mills theory to three-loop order. As an application, we determine a $g^7$ contribution to the thermodynamic pressure of hot QCD.

Measurement of jet quenching with semi-inclusive hadron-jet distributions in central Pb-Pb collisions at s N N = 2.76 $$ \sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=2.76 $$ TeV

We report the measurement of a new observable of jet quenching in central Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 2.76$ TeV, based on the semi-inclusive rate of charged jets recoiling from a high transverse momentum (high-$p_{\rm T}$) charged hadron trigger. Jets are measured using collinear-safe jet reconstruction with infrared cutoff for jet constituents of 0.15 GeV/$c$, for jet resolution parameters $R = 0.2$, 0.4 and 0.5. Underlying event background is corrected at the event-ensemble level, without imposing bias on the jet population. Recoil jet spectra are reported in the range $20<p_\mathrm{T,jet}^\mathrm{ch}<100$ GeV/$c$. Reference distributions for pp collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 2.76$ TeV are calculated using Monte Carlo and NLO pQCD methods, which are validated by comparing with measurements in pp collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 7$ TeV. The recoil jet yield in central Pb-Pb collisions is found to be suppressed relative to that in pp collisions. No significant medium-induced broadening of the intra-jet energy profile is observed within 0.5 radians relative to the recoil jet axis. The angular distribution of the recoil jet yield relative to the trigger axis is found to be similar in central Pb-Pb and pp collisions, with no significant medium-induced acoplanarity observed. Large-angle jet deflection, which may provide a direct probe of the nature of the quasi-particles in hot QCD matter, is explored.

Gluon Energy at Next-to-Leading Order in Hot QCD Using the Real-Time Formalism

Gluon Energy at Next-to-Leading Order in Hot QCD Using the Real-Time Formalism

Parton-hadron matter at finite temperature and chemical potential

The dynamics of partons and hadrons in ultra-relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions is analyzed within the Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport approach, which is based on a dynamical quasiparticle model for the partonic phase (DQPM) including a dynamical hadronization scheme while reproducing lattice QCD results in thermodynamic equilibrium for the equation-of-state as well as transport coefficients like shear and bulk viscosities or the electric conductivity of the hot QCD medium. The PHSD model reproduces a large variety of observables from SPS to LHC energies, e.g. the quark-number scaling of elliptic flow, transverse mass and rapidity spectra of charged hadrons, dilepton spectra, open and hidden charm production, collective flow coefficients etc., which are associated with the observation of a strongly interacting QGP (sQGP). The ’highlights’ of the latest results from LHC energies are presented with a focus on the correlation between the average transverse momentum < pT > and the number of charged particles Nch in p-p, p-Pb and Pb-Pb collisions at midrapidity as observed by the ALICE Collaboration.

Introduction to Hard Scattering Processes and Recent Results from Hard Probes at RHIC and LHC

A summary is presented of recent heavy-ion collision results from hard scattering processes at RHIC and LHC. Hadrons with large transverse momentum are suppressed in heavy- ion collisions compared to proton-proton interactions, including those hadrons with heavy quarks (charm, beauty). Jets are quenched and modifications to their fragmentation are observed, the effects increasing with the centrality of the heavy-ion collision. The heavy-ion measurements are compared to those in proton-proton and proton-nucleus collisions. These results when compared to theory are consistent with the suppression and jet quenching being a product of parton energy loss in a hot QCD medium. Correlations are presented for di-jets, jets with trigger photons, and hadrons with trigger jets. The di-jet correlations exhibit a di-jet energy and momentum imbalance that increases with the centrality of the collision. The correlation results indicate that the parton energy loss is redistributed to lower momentum particles at larger angles from the axis of the hard-scattered parton.

Quantifying properties of hot and dense QCD matter through systematic model-to-data comparison

We systematically compare an event-by-event heavy-ion collision model to data from the Large Hadron Collider. Using a general Bayesian method, we probe multiple model parameters including fundamental quark-gluon plasma properties such as the specific shear viscosity $\eta/s$, calibrate the model to optimally reproduce experimental data, and extract quantitative constraints for all parameters simultaneously. The method is universal and easily extensible to other data and collision models.

The QGP dynamics in relativistic collisions

The dynamics of partons and hadrons in ultra-relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions is analyzed within the Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport approach, which is based on a dynamical quasiparticle model for the partonic phase (DQPM) including a dynamical hadronization scheme while reproducing lattice QCD results in thermodynamic equilibrium for the equation-of-state as well as transport coefficients like shear and bulk viscosities or the electric conductivity of the hot QCD medium. The PHSD model reproduces a large variety of observables from SPS to LHC energies, e.g. the quark-number scaling of elliptic flow, transverse mass and rapidity spectra of charged hadrons, dilepton spectra, open and hidden charm production, collective flow coefficients etc., which are associated with the observation of a strongly interacting QGP (sQGP). The ‘highlights’ of the latest results from LHC energies are presented with a focus on observable effects from the non-equilibrium initial dynamics.

Anomalous transport effects and possible environmental symmetry ‘violation’ in heavy-ion collisions

The heavy-ion collision provides a unique many-body environment where local domains of strongly interacting chiral medium may occur and in a sense allow environmental symmetry ‘violation’ phenomena. For example, certain anomalous transport processes, forbidden in usual medium, become possible in such domains. We briefly review recent progress in both the theoretical understanding and experimental search of various anomalous transport effects (such as the chiral magnetic effect, chiral separation effect, chiral electric separation effect, chiral electric /magnetic waves, etc.) in the hot QCD fluid formed by such collisions.

Massless Mode and Positivity Violation in Hot QCD

We calculate the quark self-energy at one-loop level at high temperature, taking into account contributions from both the (chromo)electric scale gT and the (chromo)magnetic scale g^{2}T. While reproducing standard massive excitations due to the electric scale, we uncover a novel massless excitation ascribable to the magnetic scale. The residue of this massless excitation is nonpositive at all temperatures, which consequently gives rise to positivity violation in the quark spectral functions. This demonstrates the profound impact of confinement effects on thermal quark collective excitations, which manifest genuine long-range correlations in the system.

Experimental overview of p(d)–A physics

This document reports on the main topics discussed in the experimental overview talk on p(d)-A results given at the Hot Quarks 2014 Workshop. Recent measurements of the production of high transverse momentum hadrons and jets, inclusive identified particles and their correlations, quarkonia and vector bosons are presented. They represent a small set of the currently available results, which provide a deeper understanding of the hot QCD matter produced in A-A collisions and reveal the presence of unexpected phenomena in small systems.

Study of Z production in PbPb and pp collisions at s N N = 2.76 $$ \sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=2.76 $$ TeV in the dimuon and dielectron decay channels

The production of Z bosons is studied in the dimuon and dielectron decay channels in PbPb and pp collisions at sqrt(s[NN]) = 2.76 TeV, using data collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC. The PbPb data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of about 150 inverse microbarns, while the pp data sample collected in 2013 at the same nucleon-nucleon centre-of-mass energy has an integrated luminosity of 5.4 inverse picobarns. The Z boson yield is measured as a function of rapidity, transverse momentum, and collision centrality. The ratio of PbPb to pp yields, scaled by the number of inelastic nucleon-nucleon collisions, is found to be 1.06 +/- 0.05 (stat) +/- 0.08 (syst) in the dimuon channel and 1.02 +/- 0.08 (stat) +/- 0.15 (syst) in the dielectron channel, for centrality-integrated Z boson production. This binary collision scaling is seen to hold in the entire kinematic region studied, as expected for a colourless probe that is unaffected by the hot and dense QCD medium produced in heavy ion collisions.

Charm quark energy loss in infinite QCD matter using a parton cascade model

We utilize the Parton Cascade Model to study the evolution of charm quarks propagating through a thermal brick of QCD matter. We determine the energy loss and the transport coefficient '$\hat{q}$' for charm quarks. The calculations are done at a constant temperature of 350 MeV and the results are compared to analytical calculations of heavy quark energy loss in order to validate the applicability of using a Parton Cascade Model for the study of heavy quarks dynamics in hot and dense QCD matter.

Modifications of heavy-flavor spectra insNN=62.4GeV Au-Au collisions

We calculate open heavy-flavor (HF) production in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}}$=62.4 GeV utilizing a nonperturbative transport approach as previously applied in nuclear collisions at top RHIC and LHC energies. The effects of hot QCD matter are treated in a strong-coupling framework, by implementing heavy-quark diffusion, hadronization and heavy-flavor meson diffusion within a hydrodynamic background evolution. Since in our approach the heavy-flavor coupling to the medium is strongest in the pseudo-critical region, it is of interest to test its consequences at lower collision energies where the sensitivity to this region should be enhanced relative to the hotter (early) fireball temperatures reached at top RHIC and LHC energies. We find that the suppression and flow pattern of the non-photonic electrons from heavy-flavor decays at 62.4 GeV emerges from an intricate interplay of thermalization and initial-state effects, in particular a Cronin enhancement which is known to become more pronounced toward lower collision energies.

Chiral magnetic wave in an expanding QCD fluid

As a consequence of the chiral anomaly, the hydrodynamics of hot QCD matter coupled to QED allows for a long-wavelength mode of chiral charge density, the chiral magnetic wave (CMW), that provides for a mechanism of electric charge separation along the direction of an external magnetic field. Here, we investigate the efficiency of this mechanism for values of the time-dependent magnetic field and of the energy density attained in the hot QCD matter of ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions. To this end, we derive the CMW equations of motion for expanding systems by treating the CMW as a charge perturbation on top of an expanding Bjorken-type background field in the limit of small chemical potential. Both, approximate analytical and full numerical solutions to these equations of motion indicate that for the lifetime and thermodynamic conditions of ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions, the efficiency of CMW-induced electric charge separation decreases with increasing center of mass energy and that the effect is numerically very small. We note, however, that if sizable oriented asymmetries in the axial charge distribution (that are not induced by the CMW) are present in the early fluid dynamic evolution, then the mechanism of CMW-induced electric charge separation can be much more efficient.