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Azimuthal anisotropy and formation of an extreme state of strongly interacting matter at the relativistic heavy-ion collider (RHIC)

  • Elementary Particles and Fields
  • Experiment
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Abstract

Experimental results obtained by studying the azimuthal anisotropy of final states in nucleus-nucleus interactions at the energies of the relativistic heavy-ion collider (RHIC) are systematized. The medium is found to exhibit a pronounced collective behavior, which is likely to be formed at an early, parton, stage of the spacetime evolution of product hot and dense matter. Experimental data on the azimuthal anisotropy indicate that strongly interacting matter produced in the final state under extreme conditions behaves as a nearly ideal liquid rather than an ideal gas of quarks and gluons. The experimentally observed suppression of high-transverse-momentum jets and substantial modification of jetlike azimuthal correlations in heavy-ion collisions suggest that the energy loss of partons propagating in high-temperature matter featuring a high density of color charges is extremely large. The dependence of the amount of hardjet suppression in nucleus-nucleus collisions on the orientation of a jet with respect to the reaction plane was first discovered experimentally at RHIC. A strong suppression of the production of high-transverse-momentum particles and jets at RHIC is a unique phenomenon, which was discovered experimentally at lower energies.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Moscow Engineering Physics (State University), Kashirskoe sh. 31, Moscow, 115409, Russia

    V. A. Okorokov

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Correspondence to V. A. Okorokov.

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Original Russian Text © V.A. Okorokov, 2009, published in Yadernaya Fizika, 2009, Vol. 72, No. 1, pp. 155–168.

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Okorokov, V.A. Azimuthal anisotropy and formation of an extreme state of strongly interacting matter at the relativistic heavy-ion collider (RHIC). Phys. Atom. Nuclei 72, 147–160 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1134/S1063778809010177

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