No Arabic abstract
The nuclear modification factors R_{AA} and R_{CP} have been used to measure medium-induced suppression in heavy-ion collisions at sqrt{s_{NN}} = 200GeV which was among the earliest evidence for the existence of a strongly interacting medium called a quark-gluon plasma (QGP). Nuclear modification factors for asymmetric collisions (R_{dA}) have measured the Cronin Effect, an enhancement of high transverse momentum particle yields in deuteron-gold collisions relative to proton-proton collisions. A similar enhancement is observed in data presented in these proceedings and competes with the quenching caused by partonic energy loss in the QGP. In these proceedings we will present charged-hadron R_{CP} at mid-rapidity for sqrt{s_{NN}} = 7.7 - 62.4GeV as well as identified pi^{+}, K^{+}, and proton R_{CP}. Comparisons to HIJING motivate possible methods for disentangling competing modifications to nuclear transverse momentum spectra.
The measurements of particle multiplicity distributions have generated considerable interest in understanding the fluctuations of conserved quantum numbers in the Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) hadronization regime, in particular near a possible critical point and near the chemical freeze-out. We report the measurement of efficiency and centrality bin width corrected cumulant ratios ($C_{2}/C_{1}$, $C_{3}/C_{2}$) of net-$Lambda$ distributions, in the context of both strangeness and baryon number conservation, as a function of collision energy, centrality and rapidity. The results are for Au + Au collisions at five beam energies ($sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 19.6, 27, 39, 62.4 and 200 GeV) recorded with the Solenoidal Tracker at RHIC (STAR). We compare our results to the Poisson and negative binomial (NBD) expectations, as well as to Ultra-relativistic Quantum Molecular Dynamics (UrQMD) and Hadron Resonance Gas (HRG) model predictions. Both NBD and Poisson baselines agree with data within the statistical and systematic uncertainties. The ratios of the measured cumulants show no features of critical fluctuations. The chemical freeze-out temperatures extracted from a recent HRG calculation, which was successfully used to describe the net-proton, net-kaon and net-charge data, indicate $Lambda$ freeze-out conditions similar to those of kaons. However, large deviations are found when comparing to temperatures obtained from net-proton fluctuations. The net-$Lambda$ cumulants show a weak, but finite, dependence on the rapidity coverage in the acceptance of the detector, which can be attributed to quantum number conservation.
Heavy-flavor quarks are dominantly produced in initial hard scattering processes and experience the whole evolution of the system in heavy-ion collisions at RHIC energies. Thus they are suggested to be an excellent probe to the medium properties through their interaction with the medium. In this proceedings, we report our first measurement of $D^0$ production via topological reconstruction using STARs recently installed Heavy Flavor Tracker (HFT). We also report our new measurement of Nuclear Modification Factor ($R_{AA}$) of $D^0$ mesons in central Au+Au collisions at $sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 200 GeV as a function of transverse momentum ($p_{T}$). New results confirm the strong suppression at high $p_{T}$ with a much improved precision, and show that the $R_{AA}$ at high $p_{T}$ are comparable with light hadrons ($pi$) and with D meson measurements at the LHC. Furthermore, several theoretical calculations are compared to our data, and with charm diffusion coefficient 2${pi}TD_{S}$ $sim$ 2-12 can reproduce both the $D^0$ $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ data in Au+Au collisions at RHIC.
Background: Heavy-flavor production in p+p collisions tests perturbative-quantum-chromodynamics (pQCD) calculations. Modification of heavy-flavor production in heavy-ion collisions relative to binary-collision scaling from p+p results, quantified with the nuclear-modification factor (R_AA), provides information on both cold- and hot-nuclear-matter effects. Purpose: Determine transverse-momentum, pt, spectra and the corresponding R_AA for muons from heavy-flavor mesons decay in p+p and Cu+Cu collisions at sqrt(s_NN)=200 GeV and y=1.65. Method: Results are obtained using the semi-leptonic decay of heavy-flavor mesons into negative muons. The PHENIX muon-arm spectrometers measure the p_T spectra of inclusive muon candidates. Backgrounds, primarily due to light hadrons, are determined with a Monte-Carlo calculation using a set of input hadron distributions tuned to match measured-hadron distributions in the same detector and statistically subtracted. Results: The charm-production cross section in p+p collisions at sqrt{s}=200 GeV, integrated over pt and in the rapidity range 1.4<y<1.9 is found to be dsigma_ccbar/dy = 0.139 +/- 0.029 (stat) ^{+0.051}_{-0.058} (syst) mb. This result is consistent with calculations and with expectations based on the corresponding midrapidity charm-production cross section measured earlier by PHENIX. The R_AA for heavy-flavor muons in Cu+Cu collisions is measured in three centrality intervals for 1<pt<4 GeV/c. Suppression relative to binary-collision scaling (R_AA<1) increases with centrality. Conclusions: Within experimental and theoretical uncertainties, the measured heavy-flavor yield in p+p collisions is consistent with state-of-the-art pQCD calculations. Suppression in central Cu+Cu collisions suggests the presence of significant cold-nuclear-matter effects and final-state energy loss.
Double-polarization observables in the reaction $vec{e}p rightarrow evec{p}gamma{}$ have been measured at $Q^2=0.33 (GeV/c)^2$. The experiment was performed at the spectrometer setup of the A1 Collaboration using the 855 MeV polarized electron beam provided by the Mainz Microtron (MAMI) and a recoil proton polarimeter. From the double-polarization observables the structure function $P_{LT}^perp$ is extracted for the first time, with the value $(-15.4 pm 3.3 (stat.)^{+1.5}_{-2.4} (syst.)) GeV^{-2}$, using the low-energy theorem for Virtual Compton Sattering. This structure function provides a hitherto unmeasured linear combination of the generalized polarizabilities of the proton.
Ultra-peripheral collisions of heavy ions and protons are the energy frontier for electromagnetic interactions. Both photonuclear and two-photon collisions are studied, at collision energies that are far higher than are available elsewhere. In this review, we will discuss physics topics that can be addressed with UPCs, including nuclear shadowing and nuclear structure and searches for beyond-standard-model physics.