No Arabic abstract
Upcoming experimental programs will look for signatures of a possible critical point in the QCD phase diagram in fluctuation observables. To understand and predict these signatures, one must account for the fact that the dynamics of any critical fluctuations must be out-of-equilibrium: because of critical slowing down, the fluctuations cannot stay in equilibrium as the droplet of QGP produced in a collision expands and cools. Furthermore, their out-of-equilibrium dynamics must also influence the hydrodynamic evolution of the cooling droplet. The recently developed Hydro+ formalism allows for a consistent description of both the hydrodynamics and the out-of-equilibrium fluctuations, including the feedback between them. We shall explicitly demonstrate how this works, setting up a Hydro+ simulation in a simplified setting: a rapidity-independent fireball undergoing radial flow with an equation of state in which we imagine a critical point close to the $mu_B=0$ axis of the phase diagram. Within this setup, we show that we can quantitatively capture non-equilibrium phenomena, including critical fluctuations over a range of scales and memory effects. Furthermore, we illustrate the interplay between the dynamics of the fluctuations and the hydrodynamic flow of the fireball: as the fluid cools and flows, the dynamical fluctuations lag relative to how they would evolve if they stayed in equilibrium; there is then a backreaction on the flow itself due to the out-of-equilibrium fluctuations; and, in addition, the radial flow transports fluctuations outwards by advection. Within our model, we find that the backreaction from the out-of-equilibrium fluctuations does not yield dramatically large effects in the hydrodynamic variables. Further work will be needed in order to check this quantitative conclusion in other settings but, if it persists, this will considerably simplify future modelling.
We calculate the holographic entanglement entropy for the holographic QCD phase diagram considered in [Knaute, Yaresko, Kampfer (2017), arXiv:1702.06731] and explore the resulting qualitative behavior over the temperature-chemical potential plane. In agreement with the thermodynamic result, the phase diagram exhibits the same critical point as the onset of a first-order phase transition curve. We compare the phase diagram of the entanglement entropy to that of the thermodynamic entropy density and find a striking agreement in the vicinity of the critical point. Thus, the holographic entanglement entropy qualifies to characterize different phase structures. The scaling behavior near the critical point is analyzed through the calculation of critical exponents.
Supplementing the holographic Einstein-Maxwell-dilaton model of [O. DeWolfe, S.S. Gubser, C. Rosen, Phys. Rev. D83 (2011) 086005; O. DeWolfe, S.S. Gubser, C. Rosen, Phys. Rev. D84 (2011) 126014] by input of lattice QCD data for 2+1 flavors and physical quark masses for the equation of state and quark number susceptibility at zero baryo-chemical potential we explore the resulting phase diagram over the temperature-chemical potential plane. A first-order phase transition sets in at a temperature of about 112 MeV and a baryo-chemical potential of 612 MeV. We estimate the accuracy of the critical point position in the order of approximately 5-8% by considering parameter variations and different low-temperature asymptotics for the second-order quark number susceptibility. The critical pressure as a function of the temperature has a positive slope, i.e. the entropy per baryon jumps up when crossing the phase border line from larger values of temperature/baryo-chemical potential, thus classifying the phase transition as a gas liquid one. The updated holographic model exhibits in- and outgoing isentropes in the vicinity of the first-order phase transition.
Since the incident nuclei in heavy-ion collisions do not carry strangeness, the global net strangeness of the detected hadrons has to vanish. We show that there is an intimate relation between strangeness neutrality and baryon-strangeness correlations. In the context of heavy-ion collisions, the former is a consequence of quark number conservation of the strong interactions while the latter are sensitive probes of the character of QCD matter. We investigate the sensitivity of baryon-strangeness correlations on the freeze-out conditions of heavy-ion collisions by studying their dependence on temperature, baryon- and strangeness chemical potential. The impact of strangeness neutrality on the QCD equation of state at finite chemical potentials will also be discussed. We model the low-energy sector of QCD by an effective Polyakov loop enhanced quark-meson model with 2+1 dynamical quark flavors and use the functional renormalization group to account for the non-perturbative quantum fluctuations of hadrons.
The net-baryon number fluctuations for three-flavor quark matter are computed within the Polyakov extended Nambu$-$Jona-Lasinio model. Two models with vanishing and nonvanishing vector interactions are considered. While the former predicts a critical end point (CEP) in the phase diagram, the latter predicts no CEP. We show that the nonmonotonic behavior of the susceptibilities in the phase diagram is still present even in the absence of a CEP. Therefore, from the nonmonotonic behavior of the susceptibilities solely, one cannot assume the existence of a CEP. We analyze other possible properties that may distinguish the two scenarios, and determine the behavior of the net-baryon number fluctuations and the velocity of sound along several isentropes, with moderate and small values. It is shown that the value of the susceptibilities ratios and the velocity of sound at two or three isentropic lines could possibly allow to distinguish both scenarios, a phase diagram with or without CEP. Smoother behaviors of these quantities may indicate the nonexistence of a CEP. We also discuss the critical behavior of the strange sector.
We present a fully dynamical model to study the chiral and deconfinement transition of QCD simultaneously. The quark degrees of freedom constitute a heat bath in local equilibrium for both order parameters, the sigma field and a dynamical Polyakov loop. The nonequilibrium evolution of these fields is described by Langevin equations including dissipation and noise. In several quench scenarios we are able to observe a delay in the relaxation times near the transition temperature for a critical point as well as a first-order phase transition scenario. During the hydrodynamical expansion of a hot quark fluid we find a strong enhancement of thermal fluctuations at the first-order transition compared to a scenario with a critical point.