118569348
The phase diagram of QCD at small chemical potentials
We investigate the phase diagram of QCD at small chemical potentials, ie, when chiral and flavour symmetry breaking involves the pairing of a quark and an antiquark. The phase diagram of two-flavour QCD at small chemical potentials involves chiral symmetry restoration and charged pion condensation. We extend previous studies of the topology of the phase diagram, in sections with high degree of symmetry, to the physical case of fully broken flavour symmetry, using generic thermodynamic arguments. We argue that the extension is unique and present the result. In three flavour QCD the phase diagram for chiral symmetry restoration is less well constrained. However, we argue that present lattice data allows just two different phase diagrams, which we discuss.
122166973
The phase diagram of QCD: methods and logic of the comparison of experiments and theory
Abstract A small review of the phase diagram of QCD is presented. This is followed by a discussion of the conditions under which experimental data on the fluctuations of conserved quantities in heavy-ion collisions can be treated in the grand canonical ensemble. A robust method for detecting the presence of a nearby critical point in experiments is given. There is a short discussion of the need for non-Gaussian error analysis.
17443615
Lattice QCD for RHIC
I briefly introduce the methods by which lattice QCD predictions for RHIC are obtained. Next I deal with lattice determinations of strangeness production and event-to-event fluctuations of conserved quantities. I also present a new diagrammatic method for computing derivatives with respect to chemical potentials, and conclude with discussions of some tests of thermal perturbation theory which follow.
121387686
Hybrid Monte Carlo simulations of a two-dimensional gauge theory
Through a study of the dynamics of the two-dimensional U(1) pure gauge theory we find exponential slowing down in barrier penetration problems. We verify that the dynamical critical exponent in HMC can be tuned exactly to 1, and that normal and gauge fixed updates have equal cost.
119431013
A precise determination of T_c in QCD from scaling
Existing lattice data on the QCD phase transition are analyzed in renormalized perturbation theory. In quenched QCD it is found that T_c scales for lattices with only 3 time slices, and that T_c/Lambda_msbar=1.15 \pm 0.05. A preliminary estimate in QCD with two flavours of dynamical quarks shows that this ratio depends on the quark mass. For realistic quark masses we estimate T_c/Lambda_msbar=0.49 \pm 0.02. We also investigate the equation of state in quenched QCD at 1-loop order in renormalised perturbation theory.
123004962
Flavour degrees of freedom and the transition temperature in QCD
We study the finite temperature transition in QCD with four flavours of dynamical quarks. Our simulation is performed on an 8×16 3 lattice for quarks of mass ma=0.01. At the coupling β c =5.15, we find long-lived metastable states, as well as an abrupt change in the entropy density, suggesting a first order phase transition. Using presently available results from corresponding calculations of the hadron masses and the chiral condensate, this gives us a transition temperature T c ≅100 MeV, which is a factor two lower than the transition temperature found in quenched QCD.
122095360
Gauge theories of massive vector fields without scalar fields
We show that it is possible to formulate gauge theories of massive vector fields without introducing physical scalar fields. Examples of such gauge theories are provided by applications of our treatment to the massive Yang-Mills field, a charged vector field interacting with the photon field, and a model of weak and electromagnetic interactions. One-loop renormalizability of each of these systems is discussed. It is suggested that instead of postulating the existence of hypothetical particles to obtain renormalizable gauge theories, it might be worthwhile to construct gauge theories with limited renormalizability by using the formalism described here.
121068931
The thermodynamic model for relativistic heavy ion collisions
Abstract The collision between two heavy ions at high energies is discussed within the framework of a statistical model which is developed step by step so that it can be followed by a reader unfamiliar with this approach. As we hope to show, the statistical model forms a comprehensive framework for investigating various aspects of such collisions. When statistical thermodynamics is coupled with a one and two fireball model or a firestreak model, single particle and multiparticle inclusive cross sections can be evaluated. Specifically, single particle proton, deuteron, triton and pion cross sections are calculated and compared with experiment. Two particle correlations are discussed using the microcanonical ensemble. Multiplicity distributions are evaluated using the canonical ensemble and composite particle formation is simply obtained from the grand canonical ensemble. The power law behaviour of composite particle cross sections is studied. The thermodynamic model is justified by calculating various reaction rates. Many comparisons with experimental data are made.
121995970
A check on the geometrical assumptions in models of relativistic heavy ion collisions
Abstract The results of a recent experiment can be used to test clearly the geometrical assumptions of a variety of models for heavy ion collisions. Frequently used models are seen to fail quantitatively; the data show the need for incorporating nuclear transparency; both multiple and clean knockout collisions are needed.
17387019
Inhomogeneous nucleation in a quark-hadron phase transition
The effect of subcritical hadron bubbles on a first-order quark-hadron phase transition is studied. These subcritical hadron bubbles are created due to thermal fluctuations, and can introduce a finite amount of phase mixing (quark phase mixed with hadron phase) even at and above the critical temperature. For reasonable choices of surface tension and correlation length, as obtained from the lattice QCD calculations, we show that the amount of phase mixing at the critical temperature remains below the percolation threshold. Thus, as the system cools below the critical temperature, the transition proceeds through the nucleation of critical-size hadron bubbles from a metastable quark-gluon phase (QGP), within an inhomogeneous background populated by an equilibrium distribution of subcritical hadron bubbles. The inhomogeneity of the medium results in a substantial reduction of the nucleation barrier for critical bubbles. Using the corrected nucleation barrier, we estimate the amount of supercooling for different parameters controlling the phase transition, and briefly discuss its implications to cosmology and heavy-ion collisions.
118484055
Symmetry energy from fragment observables in the canonical thermodynamic model
Different formulas relating measurable fragment isotopic observables to the symmetry energy of excited nuclei were proposed and applied to the analysis of heavy ion collision data in the recent literature. In this article, we examine the quality of the different expressions in the framework of the McGill canonical thermodynamic model (CTM). We show that even in the idealized situation of canonical equilibrium and in the absence of secondary decay, these formulas do not give a precise reconstruction of the symmetry energy of the fragmenting source. However, both isotopic widths and isoscaling appear very well correlated to the physical symmetry energy.