Critical Opalescence in Baryonic QCD Matter

2006/02/06 by N. G. Antoniou, F. K. Diakonos, F. Κ. Diakonos +3 · 4 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Baryon #Condensed matter physics #Critical phenomena #Critical point (mathematics) #High-Energy Particle Collisions Research #Intermittency #Isoscalar #Lattice QCD #Nuclear matter #Nuclear physics #Nucleon #Particle physics #Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies #Phase transition #Physics #Pion #QCD matter #Quantum Chromodynamics and Particle Interactions #Quantum chromodynamics #Strange matter #Thermodynamics #hep-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.97.032002

published as Phys.Rev.Lett. 97 (2006) 032002 · 7 pages, 1 figure

arxiv created 2006/02/06 · openalex publication_date 2006/07/21 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

We show that critical opalescence, a clear signature of second-order phase transition in conventional matter, manifests itself as critical intermittency in QCD matter produced in experiments with nuclei. This behavior is revealed in transverse momentum spectra as a pattern of power laws in factorial moments, to all orders, associated with baryon production. This phenomenon together with a similar effect in the isoscalar sector of pions (sigma mode) provide us with a set of observables associated with the search for the QCD critical point in experiments with nuclei at high energies.

Citations

• Critical QCD in nuclear collisions
• Universality, the QCD critical and tricritical point, and the quark number susceptibility

Cited by

• Correlation Integral vs. second order Factorial Moments and an efficient computational technique
• Search for the QCD critical point in nuclear collisions at 158A GeV at the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS)
• Probing criticality with deep learning in relativistic heavy-ion collisions
• Proton correlations and apparent intermittency in the UrQMD model with hadronic potentials