Related papers: Towards the Quark Gluon Plasma
In nucleus-nucleus collisions at ultra-relativistic energies matter is formed with initial energy density significantly exceeding the critical energy density for the transition from hadronic to partonic matter. We will review the…
In high-energy nuclear collisions, the new phase of the quark-gluon plasma is indicated by an anomalous increase in pressure, an excess of direct photon production, an excess of strangeness production, and an anomalous J/psi suppression. We…
Highlights of the results from ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions at CERN-SPS are reviewed. In particular, I discuss how the experimental results indicate that a collective strongly interacting system has been produced, and what are the…
We present an overview of selected aspects of ultrarelativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions, a research program devoted to the study of strongly interacting matter at high energy densities and in particular to the characterization of the…
Relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions create a "fireball" of strongly interacting matter at high energy density. At very high energy this is suggested to be partonic matter, but at lower energy it should consist of yet unknown hadronic,…
Perturbative analysis of parton kinetics for high energy nuclear collisions shows, that thermal equilibration of gluons happens very fast, while quark production is much slower. A simple 'minimal model' is proposed which includes only…
We review the progress in understanding the strange particle yields in nuclear collisions and their role in signalling quark-gluon plasma formation. We report on new insights into the formation mechanisms of strange particles during…
We propose a unified space-time picture of baryon stopping and quark-gluon plasma creation in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions. It is assumed that the highly Lorentz contracted nuclei are decelerated by the coherent color field which…
Ultrarelativistic collisions of large nuclei produce a short-lived plasma of deconfined quarks and gluons. Of all the GeV-energy photons detected in these nuclear collisions, only a small number are emitted directly by the quark-gluon…
Strongly interacting matter as described by the thermodynamics of QCD undergoes a phase transition, from a low temperature hadronic medium to a high temperature quark-gluon plasma state. In the early universe this transition occurred during…
Imposing an equilibrium between the thermal pressure of deconfined quarks and gluons and the dynamical compression pressure exercised by in-flowing nuclear matter, we study the initial thermal conditions reached in a quark-gluon plasma…
The experimental results on the pion, strangeness and J/psi production in high energy nuclear collisions are discussed. The anomalous energy dependence of pion and strangeness production is consistent with the hypothesis that a transition…
In peripheral heavy-ion collisions at ultra-relativistic energies, usually only parts of the colliding nuclei effectively interact with each other. In the overlapping zone, a fireball or quark-gluon plasma is produced. The excitation energy…
A hot and dense state of nuclear matter, known as the quark-gluon plasma, is created in collisions of ultrarelativistic heavy nuclei. Highly energetic quarks and gluons, collectively referred to as partons, lose energy as they travel…
In ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions the produced high temperature, high energy density state will cross different phases of the strongly interacting matter. The original idea of quark-gluon plasma formation has been evolved and the…
After a brief review of the various scenarios for quarkonium production in ultra-relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions we focus on the ingredients and assumptions underlying the statistical hadronization model. We then confront model…
Quarkonia ($J/\psi$, $\psi$', $\Upsilon$) production provides a sensitive probe of gluon distributions and their modification in nuclei; and is a leading probe of the hot-dense (deconfined) matter created in high-energy collisions of heavy…
It is believed that a novel state of matter - Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP) will be transiently produced if normal hadronic matter is subjected to sufficiently high temperature and/or density. We have investigated the possibility of QGP…
At the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) collisions of heavy ions at nucleon-nucleon energies of 200 GeV appear to have created a new form of matter thought to be a deconfined state of the partons that ordinarily are bound in…
Thirty years ago, the suppression of quarkonium production in heavy-ion collisions was first proposed as an unambiguous signature for the formation of a Quark-Gluon Plasma. Recent results from the LHC run 2 have led to an unprecedented…