2009/02/28 by G. Wilk, Grzegorz Wilk, Z. Włodarczyk +1 · 4 citations
Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #High-Energy Particle Collisions Research #Statistical Distribution Estimation and Applications #Statistical Mechanics and Entropy #hep-ph #nucl-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevc.79.054903
published as Phys. Rev. C79 (2009) 054903 · 11 pages, 5 figures; revised version, new references and footnote added
arxiv created 2009/03/31 · openalex publication_date 2009/05/06 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We investigate the multiplicity fluctuations observed in high-energy nuclear collisions attributing them to intrinsic fluctuations of temperature of the hadronizing system formed in such processes. To account for these fluctuations, we replace the usual Boltzmann-Gibbs (BG) statistics by the nonextensive Tsallis statistics characterized by the nonextensivity parameter q, with |q\ensuremath-1| being a direct measure of fluctuation. In the limit of vanishing fluctuations, q\ensuremath→1 and Tsallis statistics converge to the usual BG. We evaluate the nonextensivity parameter q and its dependence on the hadronizing system size from the experimentally observed collision centrality dependence of the mean multiplicity \ensuremath⟨N\ensuremath⟩ and its variance Var(N). We attribute the observed system size dependence of q to the finiteness of the hadronizing source, with q=1 corresponding to an infinite, thermalized source with a fixed temperature, and with q>1 (which is observed) corresponding to a finite source in which both the temperature and energy fluctuate.