Related papers: Small x physics and the initial conditions in heav…
In this thesis the Color Glass Condensate (CGC) framework, which describes quantum chromodynamics (QCD) at high energy, is applied to various scattering processes. Higher order corrections to the CGC evolution equations, known as the BK and…
Multiple interactions of quarks and gluons in high-energy heavy-ion collisions may give rise to interesting phemomena of color charges propagating in high-density QCD matter. We study the dynamics of multi-parton systems produced in…
Heavy-ion collisions at the BNL-RHIC collider can probe whether gluon saturation effects in nuclei at small x have set in, or whether leading-twist perturbative estimates of particle production are still applicable. I discuss that soon to…
As the value of the longitudinal momentum carried by partons in a ultra-relativistic hadron becomes small, one observes a growth of their density. When the parton density becomes close to a value of order $1/\alpha_s$, it does not grow any…
A systematic determination of the gluon distribution is of fundamental interest in understanding the parton structure of nuclei and the QCD dynamics. Currently, the behavior of this distribution at small $x$ (high energy) is completely…
Reliable knowledge of parton distributions at large x is crucial for many searches for new physics signals in the next generation of collider experiments. Although these are generally well determined in the small and medium x range, it has…
Nuclear shadowing and color glass condensate are possible only at sufficiently small x where parton clouds of different nucleons overlap in the longitudinal direction. Another condition vital for these effect, an overlap of partons in…
The experimental results on hadron production obtained recently at RHIC offer a new prospective on the energy dependence of the nuclear collision dynamics. In particular, it is possible that parton saturation -- the phenomenon likely…
The properties of the quark-gluon medium observed in high energy nucleus-nucleus collisions are discussed. The main experimental facts about these collisions are briefly described and compared with data about proton-proton collisions. Both…
There seems to be a general consensus now that a first glimpse of a QGP-like effect has become visible in the beautiful NA50 data on J/\psi production and the `anomalous supression' phenomenon. On the other hand, it is still widely believed…
In this paper we propose an improvement of the EKS nuclear parton distributions for the small x region of high energy processes, where the perturbative high parton density effects cannot be disregarded. We analyze the behavior of the ratios…
We make a theoretical and experimental summary of the state-of-the-art status of hot and dense QCD matter studies on selected topics. We review the Beam Energy Scan program for the QCD phase diagram and present the current status of search…
Following an explicit example, we present the chain of steps required for an event-by-event description of hadron production in high energy hadronic and nuclear collisions. We start from incoming nuclei, described in the Color Glass…
The initial conditions in high energy nucleus-nucleus collisions are determined by the small momentum fraction part of the nuclear wavefunction. This is the regime of gluon saturation and the most direct way to experimentally study it would…
This is a review of the parton cascade model (PCM) which provides a QCD-based description of nucleus-nucleus reactions at very high energy. The PCM describes the collision dynamics within the early and dense phase of the reaction in terms…
High-energy heavy-ion physics and low-energy nuclear structure physics have historically been disconnected fields. The hydrodynamic description of the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) requires input from nuclear structure to model the initial…
The relationship between RHIC and HERA data is explored using the idea of saturation (color glass condensate) as a unifying framework for interpretation. A description of the early stages of a heavy ion collision is given with the RHIC…
This work studies the production of direct photons in relativistic nuclear collisions, along with the production of hadrons. Radiation from the very first instants to the final moments of the evolution is included. The hybrid model used…
Reliable knowledge of parton distributions at large x is crucial for many searches for new physics signals in the next generation of collider experiments. Although these are generally well determined in the small and medium x range, it has…
Perturbative QCD in the small Bjorken $x$ limit can be formulated as an effective theory known as the Color Glass Condensate (CGC) formalism. The CGC formalism takes into account the dynamics of large gluon densities at small $x$ and has…