Understanding gluon density distributions and how they are modified in nuclei are among the most important goals in nuclear physics. In recent years, diffractive vector meson production measured in ultra-peripheral collisions (UPCs) at heavy-ion colliders has provided a new tool for probing the gluon density. In this Letter, we report the first measurement of $J/psi$ photoproduction off the deuteron in UPCs at the center-of-mass energy $sqrt{s_{_{rm NN}}}=200~rm GeV$ in d$+$Au collisions. The differential cross section as a function of momentum transfer $-t$ is measured. In addition, data with a neutron tagged in the deuteron-going Zero-Degree Calorimeter is investigated for the first time, which is found to be consistent with the expectation of incoherent diffractive scattering at low momentum transfer. Theoretical predictions based on the Color Glass Condensate saturation model and the gluon shadowing model are compared with the data quantitatively. A better agreement with the saturation model has been observed. With the current measurement, the results are found to be directly sensitive to the gluon density distribution of the deuteron and the deuteron breakup, which provides insights into the nuclear gluonic structure.
The chiral magnetic effect (CME) is predicted to occur as a consequence of a local violation of $cal P$ and $cal CP$ symmetries of the strong interaction amidst a strong electro-magnetic field generated in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. Experimen
tal manifestation of the CME involves a separation of positively and negatively charged hadrons along the direction of the magnetic field. Previous measurements of the CME-sensitive charge-separation observables remain inconclusive because of large background contributions. In order to better control the influence of signal and backgrounds, the STAR Collaboration performed a blind analysis of a large data sample of approximately 3.8 billion isobar collisions of $^{96}_{44}$Ru+$^{96}_{44}$Ru and $^{96}_{40}$Zr+$^{96}_{40}$Zr at $sqrt{s_{rm NN}}=200$ GeV. Prior to the blind analysis, the CME signatures are predefined as a significant excess of the CME-sensitive observables in Ru+Ru collisions over those in Zr+Zr collisions, owing to a larger magnetic field in the former. A precision down to 0.4% is achieved, as anticipated, in the relative magnitudes of the pertinent observables between the two isobar systems. Observed differences in the multiplicity and flow harmonics at the matching centrality indicate that the magnitude of the CME background is different between the two species. No CME signature that satisfies the predefined criteria has been observed in isobar collisions in this blind analysis.
We report on the first multi-differential measurement of $phi$ meson and $Xi^{-}$ hyperon production as well as the $phi/K^-$ and $phi/Xi^-$ ratio in Au+Au collisions at ${sqrt{s_{rm NN}} = rm{3,GeV}}$ with the STAR experiment under its fixed targ et configuration at RHIC. $phi$ mesons and $Xi^{-}$ hyperons are measured through their hadronic decay channels, $phirightarrow K^+K^-$ and $Xi^-rightarrow Lambdapi^-$. The transverse kinetic energy spectra of $K^-$, $phi$ and $Xi^{-}$ are presented in different centrality and rapidity intervals. The total production yields and the ratios within a $4pi$ coverage are calculated and compared to thermal model predictions. A calculation within the grand canonical ensemble framework shows a clear discrepancy from our measurement. Our data favor the canonical ensemble approach employing local strangeness conservation with a small strangeness correlation length ($r_c leq 4.2$ fm) in 0--10% central Au+Au collisions at ${sqrt{s_{rm NN}} = rm{3,GeV}}$.
We report on the measurements of directed flow $v_1$ and elliptic flow $v_2$ for hadrons ($pi^{pm}$, $K^{pm}$, $K_{S}^0$, $p$, $phi$, $Lambda$ and $Xi^{-}$) from Au+Au collisions at $sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 3 GeV and $v_{2}$ for ($pi^{pm}$, $K^{pm}$, $p$ and $overline{p}$) at 27 and 54.4 GeV with the STAR experiment. While at the two higher energy midcentral collisions the number-of-constituent-quark (NCQ) scaling holds, at 3 GeV the midrapidity $v_{2}$ is negative for all hadrons and the NCQ scaling is absent. In addition, the midrapidity $v_1$ slopes for almost all observed hadrons are found to be positive, implying dominant repulsive baryonic interactions. The features of negative $v_2$ and positive $v_1$ slope at 3 GeV can be reproduced with a baryonic mean-field in transport model calculations. These results imply that in 3 GeV Au+Au collisions, the medium is characterized by baryonic interactions.
The chiral magnetic effect (CME) refers to charge separation along a strong magnetic field due to imbalanced chirality of quarks in local parity and charge-parity violating domains in quantum chromodynamics. The experimental measurement of the charge separation is made difficult by the presence of a major background from elliptic azimuthal anisotropy. This background and the CME signal have different sensitivities to the spectator and participant planes, and could thus be determined by measurements with respect to these planes. We report such measurements in Au+Au collisions at a nucleon-nucleon center-of-mass energy of 200 GeV at the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider. It is found that the charge separation, with the flow background removed, is consistent with zero in peripheral (large impact parameter) collisions. Some indication of finite CME signals is seen with a significance of 1--3 standard deviations in mid-central (intermediate impact parameter) collisions. Significant residual background effects may, however, still be present.
According to first principle Lattice QCD calculations, the transition from quark-gluon plasma to hadronic matter is a smooth crossover in the region $mu_{rm B}leq T_{c}$. As a result, higher-order cumulants and their ratios are predicted to be negative, $C_{6}/C_{2}<0$, for example. In this paper, we report the first measurement of the midrapidity net-proton $C_{6}/C_{2}$ from 27, 54.4 and 200 GeV Au+Au collisions at RHIC. The dependence on collision centrality and kinematic acceptance in ($p_{T}$, $y$) are analyzed. While for 27 and 54.4 GeV collisions the $C_{6}/C_{2}$ values are close to zero within uncertainties, it is observed that for 200 GeV collisions, the $C_{6}/C_{2}$ ratio becomes progressively negative from peripheral to central collisions. Transport model calculations without critical dynamics predict values around zero. These observations seem to favor a smooth crossover in the high energy nuclear collisions at RHIC.
We present the first inclusive measurements of the invariant and SoftDrop jet mass in proton-proton collisions at $sqrt{s}=200$ GeV at STAR. The measurements are fully corrected for detector effects, and reported differentially in both the jet transverse momentum and jet radius parameter. We compare the measurements to established leading-order Monte Carlo event generators and find that STAR-tuned PYTHIA-6 reproduces the data, while LHC tunes of PYTHIA-8 and HERWIG-7 do not agree with the data, providing further constraints on parameter tuning. Finally, we observe that SoftDrop grooming, for which the contribution of wide-angle non-perturbative radiation is suppressed, shifts the jet mass distributions into closer agreement with the partonic jet mass as determined by both PYTHIA-8 and a next-to-leading-logarithmic accuracy perturbative QCD calculation. These measurements complement recent LHC measurements in a different kinematic region, as well as establish a baseline for future jet mass measurements in heavy-ion collisions at RHIC.
We present systematic measurements of azimuthal anisotropy for strange and multistrange hadrons ($K^{0}_{s}$, $Lambda$, $Xi$, and $Omega$) and $phi$ mesons at midrapidity ($|y| <$ 1.0) in collisions of U + U nuclei at $sqrt{s_{NN}} = 193$ GeV, recorded by the STAR detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. Transverse momentum ($p_{text{T}}$) dependence of flow coefficients ($v_{2}$, $v_{3}$, and $v_{4}$) is presented for minimum bias collisions and three different centrality intervals. Number of constituent quark scaling of the measured flow coefficients in U + U collisions is discussed. We also present the ratio of $v_{n}$ scaled by the participant eccentricity ($varepsilon_{n}leftlbrace 2 rightrbrace$) to explore system size dependence and collectivity in U + U collisions. The magnitude of $v_{2}/varepsilon_{2}$ is found to be smaller in U + U collisions than that in central Au + Au collisions contradicting naive eccentricity scaling. Furthermore, the ratios between various flow harmonics ($v_{3}/v_{2}^{3/2}$, $v_{4}/v_{2}^{4/2}$) are studied and compared with hydrodynamic and transport model calculations.
We report high-precision measurements of the longitudinal double-spin asymmetry, $A_{LL}$, for midrapidity inclusive jet and dijet production in polarized $pp$ collisions at a center-of-mass energy of $sqrt{s}=200,mathrm{GeV}$. The new inclusive jet data are sensitive to the gluon helicity distribution, $Delta g(x,Q^2)$, for gluon momentum fractions in the range from $x simeq 0.05$ to $x simeq 0.5$, while the new dijet data provide further constraints on the $x$ dependence of $Delta g(x,Q^2)$. The results are in good agreement with previous measurements at $sqrt{s}=200,mathrm{GeV}$ and with recent theoretical evaluations of prior world data. Our new results have better precision and thus strengthen the evidence that $Delta g(x,Q^2)$ is positive for $x > 0.05$.
We report a systematic measurement of cumulants, $C_{n}$, for net-proton, proton and antiproton multiplicity distributions, and correlation functions, $kappa_n$, for proton and antiproton multiplicity distributions up to the fourth order in Au+Au collisions at $sqrt{s_{mathrm {NN}}}$ = 7.7, 11.5, 14.5, 19.6, 27, 39, 54.4, 62.4 and 200 GeV. The $C_{n}$ and $kappa_n$ are presented as a function of collision energy, centrality and kinematic acceptance in rapidity, $y$, and transverse momentum, $p_{T}$. The data were taken during the first phase of the Beam Energy Scan (BES) program (2010 -- 2017) at the BNL Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) facility. The measurements are carried out at midrapidity ($|y| <$ 0.5) and transverse momentum 0.4 $<$ $p_{rm T}$ $<$ 2.0 GeV/$c$, using the STAR detector at RHIC. We observe a non-monotonic energy dependence ($sqrt{s_{mathrm {NN}}}$ = 7.7 -- 62.4 GeV) of the net-proton $C_{4}$/$C_{2}$ with the significance of 3.1$sigma$ for the 0-5% central Au+Au collisions. This is consistent with the expectations of critical fluctuations in a QCD-inspired model. Thermal and transport model calculations show a monotonic variation with $sqrt{s_{mathrm {NN}}}$. For the multiparticle correlation functions, we observe significant negative values for a two-particle correlation function, $kappa_2$, of protons and antiprotons, which are mainly due to the effects of baryon number conservation. Furthermore, it is found that the four-particle correlation function, $kappa_4$, of protons plays a role in determining the energy dependence of proton $C_4/C_1$ below 19.6 GeV, which cannot be understood by the effect of baryon number conservation.
