Collective
flow and QGP properties
RIKEN-BNL workshop
November 2003
Motivation and scope of the meeting
A large amount of data addressing collectivity effects in Au+Au
collisions at RHIC is currently becoming available. We want to gather
experienced theorists and experimentalists and stimulate discussions of
details that can be extracted out of the gained information, in
particular quantify what the data tells us about thermalization and the
nuclear equation of state, i.e. the anticipated QCD phase transition.
Through this meeting want to discuss the current status of the field
and collect the facts that have already been established, but also
discuss what future measures have to be taken to arrive at a proof that
a thermalized state beyond the critical temperature was achieved and
how we can become more quantitative in the extraction of its
thermodynamic properties.
In more detail, we plan to discuss the following issues:
- How much thermalization do the data require?
What is the maximal viscosity of matter allowed by the data?
Why is the partonic mean free path so small to allow collective effects?
How large are the parton-parton cross sections?
What can be the QGP equilibration time and mechanism?
- What is the range of equations of state allowed by the data?
Does a combination of SPS/RHIC data provide experimental evidences for
softening in the transition region (e ~ 1-2 GeV/fm^3)?
- Why is v_2 large only at mid-rapidity? Is it the particle
multiplicity, baryon number, or different initial conditions?
- Other harmonics: v_1 at large rapidity, v_4 at
mid-rapidity...
- Do strange particles phi, Omega, Cascades flow with the bulk
up to the same thermal freezeout,
or do they decouple earlier?
- How do resonances and nuclear fragments like the deuteron
participate in the flow?
What can we learn from more detailed
theory/data on freeze-out and the relation to HBT radii?
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PFK, last changed on August 13, 2003