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Title: Color instabilities in the quark–gluon plasma

Journal Article · · Physics Reports
 [1];  [2];  [3]
  1. Jan Kochanowski Univ., Kielce (Poland). Inst. of Physics; National Centre for Nuclear Research, Warsaw (Poland)
  2. Brookhaven National Lab. (BNL), Upton, NY (United States). Physics Dept.
  3. Goethe Univ., Frankfurt (Germany). Franfurt Inst. for Advanced Studies

When the quark–gluon plasma (QGP) – a system of deconfined quarks and gluons – is in a nonequilibrium state, it is usually unstable with respect to color collective modes. The instabilities, which are expected to strongly influence dynamics of the QGP produced in relativistic heavy-ion collisions, are extensively discussed under the assumption that the plasma is weakly coupled. Here, we begin by presenting the theoretical approaches to study the QGP, which include: field theory methods based on the Keldysh–Schwinger formalism, classical and quantum kinetic theories, and fluid techniques. The dispersion equations, which give the spectrum of plasma collective excitations, are analyzed in detail. We pay particular attention to a momentum distribution of plasma constituents which is obtained by deforming an isotropic momentum distribution. Mechanisms of chromoelectric and chromomagnetic instabilities are explained in terms of elementary physics. The Nyquist analysis, which allows one to determine the number of solutions of a dispersion equation without explicitly solving it, and stability criteria are also discussed. We then review various numerical approaches – purely classical or quantum – to simulate the temporal evolution of an unstable quark–gluon plasma. The dynamical role of instabilities in the processes of plasma equilibration is analyzed.

Research Organization:
Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0012704; SC0013470
OSTI ID:
1392244
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1397939
Report Number(s):
BNL-114267-2017-JA
Journal Information:
Physics Reports, Vol. 682, Issue C; ISSN 0370-1573
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 30 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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  • IX HADRON PHYSICS AND VII RELATIVISTIC ASPECTS OF NUCLEAR PHYSICS: A Joint Meeting on QCD and QCP, AIP Conference Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1063/1.1843595
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Cited By (7)

Estimates of the baryon densities attainable in heavy-ion collisions from the beam energy scan program journal July 2018
Screening properties of quark-gluon plasma obtained from distribution and correlation functions of the constituent quasiparticle model journal February 2020
Effective coupling constant of plasmons journal September 2019
Estimates of the baryon densities attainable in heavy-ion collisions from the beam energy scan program text January 2018
Effective Coupling Constant of Plasmons text January 2019
Fluctuations in ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions preprint January 2017
Dissipative type theories for Bjorken and Gubser flows preprint January 2019

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