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Results from RHIC with Implications for LHC

Book ·
OSTI ID:989746
High energy nucleus-nucleus collisions provide the means of creating nuclear matter in conditions of extreme temperature and density. The kinetic energy of the incident projectiles would be dissipated in the large volume of nuclear matter involved in the reaction. At large energy or baryon density, a phase transition is expected from a state of nucleons containing confined quarks and gluons to a state of 'deconfined' (from their individual nucleons) quarks and gluons, in chemical and thermal equilibrium, covering a volume that is many units of the confining length scale. This state of nuclear matter was originally given the name Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP), a plasma being an ionized gas. However the results at RHIC indicated that instead of behaving like a gas of free quarks and gluons, the matter created in heavy ion collisions at nucleon-nucleon c.m. energy {radical}s{sub NN} = 200 GeV appears to be more like a liquid. This matter interacts much more strongly than originally expected, as elaborated in peer reviewed articles by the 4 RHIC experiments, which inspired the theorists to give it the new name 'sQGP' (strongly interacting QGP).
Research Organization:
Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider
Sponsoring Organization:
Doe - Office Of Science
DOE Contract Number:
AC02-98CH10886
OSTI ID:
989746
Report Number(s):
BNL--93946-2010-BC; KB0201021
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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