PHYSICAL REVIEW D 103, 094029 (2021)
Interacting color strings as the origin of the liquid behavior of the quark-gluon plasma
† ‡ J. E. Ramírez ,1,2,* Bogar Díaz ,3,4,5, and C. Pajares 1, 1Departamento de Física de Partículas and Instituto Galego de Física de Altas Enerxías, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, E-15782 Santiago de Compostela, España 2Centro de Agroecología, Instituto de Ciencias, Benem´erita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Apartado Postal 165, 72000 Puebla, Puebla, M´exico 3Departamento de Física de Altas Energías, Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de M´exico, Apartado Postal 70-543, Ciudad de M´exico 04510, M´exico 4Departamento de Matemáticas, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Avenida de la Universidad 30, 28911 Legan´es, Spain 5Grupo de Teorías de Campos y Física Estadística. Instituto Gregorio Millán (UC3M), Unidad Asociada al Instituto de Estructura de la Materia, CSIC, Serrano 123, 28006 Madrid, Spain
(Received 14 December 2020; accepted 12 April 2021; published 25 May 2021)
We study the radial distribution function of the color sources (strings) formed in hadronic collisions and the requirements to obtain a liquid. As a repulsive interaction is needed, we incorporate a concentric core in the strings as well as the probability that a string allows core-core overlaps. We find systems where the difference between the gas-liquid and confined-deconfined phase transition temperatures is small. This explains the experimentally observed liquid behavior of the quark-gluon plasma above the confined- deconfined transition temperature.
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.103.094029
I. INTRODUCTION a rapidity space describing the rapidity differences of the partons. This difference is given by the energy fraction of The heavy-ion Au-Au collisions at RHIC obtained a liquid of quarks and gluons with a shear viscosity over the projectiles carried by the partons. On the other hand, the entropy density ratio lower than any other material ever strings also have a transverse extension. Thus, color strings known (quark-gluon plasma) [1–3]. This discovery was may be viewed as small areas in the transverse plane of the confirmed later in Pb-Pb collisions at LHC through the collision filled with color field created by the colliding study of all of the harmonics of the azimuthal distributions partons. Due to confinement, the strings have transverse ¼ σ 2 – σ and different correlations showing the existence of a circular areas with radius r0 = around 0.2 0.3 fm ( is collective motion of quarks and gluons [4–6]. Most of the diameter). With growing energy or size of the colliding the properties seen in heavy-ion collisions have also been systems, the number of strings grows, and they start to observed in pp and pA collisions at LHC [7] and d-Au and overlap and interact. In the color string percolation 3He-Au collisions at RHIC [8]. model (CSPM) the interaction between strings occurs Multiparticle production in pp, pA, and AA collisions is forming clusters when they overlap; the color field is given currently described in terms of color strings stretched by the SU(3) color sum. Due to the random direction of between the partons of the projectile and target, which the color field in the color space, the intensity of the decay into new strings and subsequently into hadrons. The resulting color field is only the square root of the individual strings are extended in the longitudinal space between the strings color field [9–12]. In rapidity, the interaction of partons of the colliding projectiles, which transforms it into strings is taken into account by incorporating the energy- momentum conservation of the formed clusters. This gives rise to the particle production in the forward region outside *[email protected] † [email protected] the kinematical limits, the so-called cumulative effect ‡ [email protected] observed at RHIC energies [13–15]. However, in our study we are only concerned with the transverse size. Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of At one critical string density a spanning cluster is formed the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to through the collision surface. For a uniform profile of the the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, string distribution, this critical density value, in the and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3. thermodynamic limit, matches the percolation threshold
2470-0010=2021=103(9)=094029(8) 094029-1 Published by the American Physical Society J. E. RAMÍREZ, BOGAR DÍAZ, and C. PAJARES PHYS. REV. D 103, 094029 (2021)
3 (a) (b) azimuthal distributions, obtaining a reasonable agreement 2 with the data [28,29]. In this paper, we propose a hybrid core-shell model g(r) 1 together the traditional CSPM to incorporate the excluding or repulsive interaction between strings. We do this by 0 providing the strings with a concentric region of exclusion 3 (core region) of diameter λσ (0 ≤ λ ≤ 1). The rest of the (c) (d) string area is called the shell region. We also consider a 2 probability qλ that a string allows overlap in its core with g(r) 1 the core of another string. We refer to the strings as soft or hard if they admit overlap in their core region or not, 0 respectively. Notice that the overlap condition applies only 0 1 2 3 0 1 2 3 σ σ to the core-core interactions, while all core-shell and shell- r/ r/ shell overlaps are allowed. In what follows, we call this FIG. 1. Radial distribution function for the CSPM at different modification the core-shell-color string percolation model 2 ðλ ¼ 1 ¼ 0Þ density values (πr0N=S): (a) 0.32, (b) 1.12, (c) 1.92, and (d) 2.72. (CSCSPM). Notice that (i) if ;qλ the system corresponds to a hard-disks fluid [30], (ii) if λ ¼ 0 or qλ ¼ 1 the system returns to the traditional 2D continuum of the classical two-dimensional (2D) continuum percola- q ¼ 0 ¼ 1 128 π 2 percolation [31,32], (iii) if λ this model reproduces tion model, given by N=S . = r0, where N and S are the continuum percolation of disks with hard cores [33,34], the number of strings and the collision area, respectively. and (iv) if λ ¼ 1 it resembles the random sequential This critical value can change slightly for a finite and not – absorption model [35,36]. In this sense, our model is a large N and other profiles [16 18]. This critical percolation generalization of them. For the CSCSPM, two phase density is associated with a temperature T ¼ 160 MeV, transitions are observed as a function of ðλ;qλÞ: ideal which corresponds to the confined-deconfined phase tran- gas to nonideal to liquid. This paper aims to determine if sition of the quark and gluon matter [19]. some combinations of ðλ;qλÞ allow the system to simulta- On the other hand, the physical structure of the systems neously exhibit the gas-liquid transition and the emergence can be determined by analyzing the behavior of the radial ð Þ of the spanning cluster. To this end, we determine a) the distribution function g r (also known as the pair correla- gas-liquid phase transition temperature, which is calculated tion function). It describes how the average number of through the observation of the oscillation of the radial particles varies as a function of the radial distance from a distribution function, and b) the critical temperature asso- point. It is widely used to characterize packing structures ciated with the percolation threshold, which corresponds to and contains information about long-range interparticle the QGP formation temperature. correlations and their organization [20]. The plan of the paper is as follows. In Sec. II, we present Since models considering strings like fully penetrable how to calculate the temperature in percolation-based string disks correspond to the picture of the classical ideal gas, it models. In Sec. III, we provide the simulation and data is expected that they will have a flat radial distribution analysis methods. In Sec. IV, we show the phase diagram of function. In Fig. 1, we show for the CSPM the flat behavior the CSCSPM in terms of ðλ;qλÞ, and determine the region of gðrÞ, regardless of the string density. This happens even in the λ − qλ plane where the transition and critical temper- when the CSPM can explain most of the experimental data atures are close. Finally, Sec. V contains our conclusions on pp, pA, and AA collisions, including the azimuthal and perspectives. distributions of the produced particles, as well as the temperature dependence of the ratio between the shear and bulk viscosities over the entropy density [21,22]. This II. TEMPERATURE FOR PERCOLATION-BASED ideal gas behavior of the CSPM has been observed by some STRING MODELS authors. For example, in Refs. [23,24] the authors analyzed The interaction among strings gives rise to a reduction in the electrical and thermal conductivity of the quark-gluon multiplicity and an increase in the average transverse plasma (QGP) using the CSPM and found that the system momentum. A cluster of n strings (remember that each corresponds to an ideal gas. Also, in Ref. [18] the authors string is considered as a disk) that occupies an area Sn performed a finite-size analysis of the speed of sound and ⃗ behaves as a single color source with a higher color field Qn concluded that the CSPM corresponds to a mean field corresponding to the vectorial sum of the color charges of theory. On the other hand, there are other strings models ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ each individual string Q1.AsQ ¼ nQ1 and the individual [25–27] where the strings interact in a different way, for n string colors may be oriented in an arbitrary manner instance, by color rearrangements [26] or by shoving when ⃗ ⃗ they are close to each other [27]. The repulsion between respective to each other, the average Q1iQ1j is zero and ⃗2 ⃗2 strings has also been used to study the harmonics of the Qn ¼ nQ1. Knowing the color charge, we can calculate the
094029-2 INTERACTING COLOR STRINGS AS THE ORIGIN OF THE … PHYS. REV. D 103, 094029 (2021) multiplicity μn and the mean transverse momentum squared The Schwinger QED2 string-breaking mechanism produces h 2 i τ ∼ 1 pT n of the particles produced by a cluster, which are these pairs at the time fm=c, which subsequently proportional to the color charge and color field, respec- hadronize to produce the observed hadrons. The Schwinger 2 ∼ tively, as distribution for the produced particles is dN=dPT ð− 2 π 2Þ sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi exp pT =x , where the average value of the string tension (color field) is hx2i. The chromoelectric field in μ ¼ nSnμ ð Þ n 1; 1a the string is not constant, but fluctuates around its average S1 value. Such fluctuations lead to a Gaussian distribution for sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi the chromoelectric field, transforming the Schwinger dis- h 2 i ¼ nS1h 2 i ð Þ tribution into the thermal distribution [19] pT n pT 1; 1b Sn sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi dN 2π 2 ∼ exp −p ; ð6Þ where μ1 and hp i1 are the multiplicity and transverse 2 T h 2i T dpT x momentum squared of the particles produced from a single ¼ π 2 string with transverse area S1 r0. For strings just with hx2i¼πhp2 i =FðηÞ. Equation (6) shows that the ¼ μ ¼ μ T 1 touching each other, Sn nS1 and therefore n n 1 effective temperature is h 2 i ¼h 2 i and pT n pT 1. On the other hand, whenp stringsffiffiffi fully sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi overlap, S ¼ S1 and therefore μ ¼ nμ1 and pffiffiffin n hp2 i hp2 i ¼ nhp2 i , so that the multiplicity is maximally ðηÞ¼ T 1 ð Þ T n T 1 T 2 ðηÞ: 7 suppressed and the transverse momentum is maximally F enhanced. In the thermodynamic limit, the average value of This temperature is related to the Hawking-Unruh effect nS1=S for all of the clusters is [11] n AA pp [38,39].In and collisions the thermalization can η 1 occur through the existence of an event horizon due to a nS1 ¼ ¼ ð Þ −η 2 ; 2 rapid deceleration of the colliding nuclei [40]. Barrier S 1 − e FðηÞ n penetration of the event horizon leads to a partial loss of information and is the reason for the stochastic thermal- with η ¼ NS1=S being the filling factor, where N and S are − ¯ the number of strings and total surface area, respectively. ization of the q q pairs. In string percolation, as clusters The function FðηÞ is called the color reduction factor, grow and cover most of the collision area, this local which can be written in terms of the area covered by strings temperature can be regarded as the temperature of the total ϕðηÞ as thermal distribution. In the 2D continuum percolation, for a uniform density profile, the critical filling factor at which sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi the spanning cluster emerges is η ∼ 1.128 [32]. This value ϕðηÞ c ðηÞ¼ ð Þ can change slightly for a finite N and other profiles [16–18]. F η : 3 pIntroducingffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi this value into Eq. (7), for a reasonable value of h 2 i pT 1 around 200 MeV, we obtain a critical temperature In the thermodynamic limit, for fully penetrable disks Tc around 160 MeV, which corresponds to the confined- [9,37], deconfined phase transition of the quark and gluon matter [19]. ϕðηÞ¼1 − e−η: ð4Þ
However, the explicit form of ϕ depends on the considered III. SIMULATION METHOD AND DATA ANALYSIS string model, e.g., if the system is finite or without periodic boundary conditions with a particular geometry [18] or (as In this section we discuss the computational implemen- in our case) if the system is composed of a combination of tation to calculate the radial distribution function gðrÞ, disks allowing overlap or not in the core region. Now, which is the average number density at a radial distance Eqs. (1a) and (1b) can be written as from a tagged string relative to the ideal-gas case (N=L2). The plot of this function reveals the phase at which the μ ¼ NFðηÞμ1; ð5aÞ system is [30]. In the case of an ideal gas, it corresponds to a flat function, indicating that the system is well distributed 2 hp i1 and that any disk may be at any place. Another situation hp2 i¼ T : ð5bÞ T FðηÞ corresponds to a diluted system composed of interacting disks. In this case, gðrÞ shows a global maximum around We must recall that the strings decay into new ones the distance λσ as a consequence of the (short-distance) through color neutral q − q¯ or qq − q¯ q¯ pair production. repulsive interaction. Nevertheless, as r increases, gðrÞ
094029-3 J. E. RAMÍREZ, BOGAR DÍAZ, and C. PAJARES PHYS. REV. D 103, 094029 (2021) becomes flat due to the low number density. Finally, if the shell, which for the case of a hard string are at least to a number density increases, the distance between the strings radial distance λσ. Meanwhile, the second maximum becomes smaller, the particle interactions are more frequent, corresponds to the location of the next-to-nearest neigh- and the radial distribution function starts to oscillate. This bors. We do this because for other values of (λ;qλ)wedo behavior occurs because the particles settle around each not expect to exactly reproduce the radial distribution other. From the perspective of a tagged particle, it looks to be function for a classical fluid since, in this work, gðrÞ is surrounded by a first shell of particles at a distance equivalent computed as the average over system simulations where to the repulsive interaction range. They are the nearest the tagged string may be soft or hard. In Fig. 2 we show neighbors. Subsequently, if the number density is high some examples of this classification for different enough, a second shell could arise: the next-to-nearest pairs ðλ;qλÞ. neighbors. Thus, particle interactions give rise to a structured We analyze gðrÞ in a segment of length λσ, but as r takes system, identified as a liquid (observed in x-ray scattering discrete values, it is necessary to establish a condition on [41] and nonvibrating magnetic granular systems [42] how many consecutive points we are going to check. We experiments). select five points; this implies that a transition from an ideal In the computational implementation we use the random gas to a nonideal gas is detected if λ ≥ 0.2. The classi- sequential addition algorithm [43] to add disk by disk, with fication begins with the pair ðλ ¼ 1;qλ ¼ 0Þ (hard disk the corresponding ðλ;qλÞ. The simulation process is fluid limit) and we search if the system shows a liquid-like stopped according to the observable under calculation. structure for some η. Taking into account that the systems To determine gðrÞ we add until 200 strings (if possible) should approach the ideal-gas case as λ decreases and qλ distributed into a square box of size L ¼ 8σ and randomly increases, we determine that if for some ðλ0;qλ0Þ the system assigned as soft or hard according to qλ. The first added does not manifest the liquid-like structure for all η, then for string is allocated in the geometrical center of the box and it ðλ;qλ0Þ with λ < λ0 or ðλ0;qλÞ with qλ >qλ0 it will not is taken as a trial disk. Then, gðrÞ is calculated as show the liquid-like structure anymore. We use the same considerations for the transition from a nonideal gas to an nðrÞL2 ideal gas. gðrÞ¼ ; ð8Þ Nð2πðr þ 0.5ΔrÞþπΔr2Þ We use the Mertens-Moore method [32] to determinate the percolation threshold in the CSCSPM. Unlike the where nðrÞ is the average number of strings at a distance determination of gðrÞ, now we add disks until the emer- between r and r þ Δr from the trial disk [33,34].Itis gence of the spanning cluster and save the number nc of 4 computed over 1 × 106 simulated systems, starting with N ¼ added disks. Then, using the information of 10 simulated ð Þ 5 and increasing it in steps of ΔN ¼ 5,andΔr ¼ 0.035. systems, we calculate the probability fL n that a spanning We classify the pair values ðλ;qλÞ for each η according to cluster exists when n disks have been added. The perco- 0 ðηÞ η gðrÞ and its derivative with respect to r, g ðrÞ, which is lation probability PL at is computed (as in Ref. [32]) ð Þ calculated using the five-point stencil method (with a by convoluting the fL n probability with the Poisson 2 2 spacing between points of Δr). The classification criteria distribution with average α ¼ ηL =πr0, for several η values are as follows (cf. Ref. [30]), around the maximum of the distribution of ηc. Then, each (1) Ideal gas: if gðrÞ is a flat function. data set is fitted to the function (2) Nonideal gas: if gðrÞ has a global maximum around 0 r1 ¼ λσ and g ðrÞ has a sustained negative trend 1 η − η ðηÞ¼ 1 þ cL ð Þ for λ 094029-4 INTERACTING COLOR STRINGS AS THE ORIGIN OF THE … PHYS. REV. D 103, 094029 (2021) (a.1) (a.2) (a.3) (a.4) 1 g(r) 0 (b.1) (b.2) (b.3) (b.4) 1 g(r) 0 (c.1) (c.2) (c.3) (c.4) 1 g(r) 0 0 1 2 3 0 1 2 3 0 1 2 3 0 1 2 3 r/σ r/σ r/σ r/σ FIG. 2. Examples of the structures of core-shell-color string systems. We show gðrÞ for three different pairs ðλ;qλÞ [(a) (λ ¼ 0.4;qλ ¼ 0.65), (b) (λ ¼ 0.6;qλ ¼ 0.4), and (c) (λ ¼ 1;qλ ¼ 0)] and how it changes as η varies. In panels (a.1), (b.1), and (c.1), the filling factor is η ¼ 0.061. These systems are diluted and show an ideal-gas structure. In panels (a.2), (b.2), and (c.2), the filling factor corresponds to the transition from an ideal gas to a nonideal gas (η ¼ 1.534, 0.429, and 0.184, respectively). In panels (b.3) and (c.3) the filling factor is η ¼ 0.982 and 0.307, respectively. These cases are when we observe the transition from a nonideal gas to a liquid-like structure. In panels (a.3) and (a.4) (η ¼ 0.981 and 2.454, respectively), the systems still show the nonideal gas structure. Finally, in panels (b.4) and (c.4) we have the maximum possible value of η (2.454 and 0.429, respectively) and these systems possess a liquid-like structure. − η ϕðη Þ 1=4 To measure the area covered by strings we draw a square τ ≔ Tc Tc ¼ 1 − c c ð Þ 20 ; 10 grid with spacing L= . Then, we count the cells whose Tc ηcϕðηcÞ center is inside of at least one disk. In this way, the area is 2 approximated as AL ¼ N L =400, where N is the number of counted cells. We measure the area in the conditions: a) where ηc is the minimum density at which the system the density of the nonideal gas to liquid-like transition, and shows a liquid-like structure, while ηc is the percolation b) the emergence of the spanning cluster. In particular, for τ h 2 i threshold. Notice that a) is independent of pT 1 [which situation b), it is possible to compute the area in the may dependent on (λ, qλ) and on the size of the system], b) thermodynamic limit. In this case, we determine the mean it only depends on the critical filling factors, η and η , and ð Þ c c area AL nc that covers the nc strings. Then, the area the corresponding covered area, and c) it can be interpreted ϕðη Þ covered by strings in the percolation threshold, c ,is as the relative deviation between T and T . ð Þ c c calculated as the convolution of AL nc with the Poisson As we have a discrete set in the pairs (λ, qλ), we 2 2 distribution with average αc ¼ ηcLL =πr0. The finite-size interpolate τ with cubic splines to determine the regions −1=ν effects on ϕLðηcÞ satisfy ϕðηcÞ − ϕLðηcLÞ ∝ L [this wherein it takes values less than τ0 ¼ 0.005,0.02,0.05,0.1. relation is no longer valid as ðλ;qλÞ → ð1; 0Þ, this zone These results allow us to determinate the regions where Tc does not belong to the cases discussed above]. is bounded as ð1 − τ0ÞTc