arXiv subjects

Francesco Scardina

Publications and source records attributed to Francesco Scardina.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2019

Towards the determination of heavy-quark transport coefficients in quark-gluon plasma

Several transport models have been employed in recent years to analyze heavy-flavor meson spectra in high-energy heavy-ion collisions. Heavy-quark transport coefficients extracted from these models with their default parameters vary, however, by up to a factor of 5 at high momenta. To investigate the origin of this large theoretical uncertainty, a systematic comparison of heavy-quark transport coefficients is carried out between various transport models. Within a common scheme devised for the nuclear modification factor of charm quarks in a brick medium of a quark-gluon plasma, the systematic uncertainty of the extracted drag coefficient among these models is shown to be reduced to a factor of 2, which can be viewed as the smallest intrinsic systematical error band achievable at present time. This indicates the importance of a realistic hydrodynamic evolution constrained by bulk hadron spectra and of heavy-quark hadronization for understanding the final heavy-flavor hadron spectra and extracting heavy-quark drag coefficient. The transverse transport coefficient is less constrained due to the influence of the underlying mechanism for heavy-quark medium interaction. Additional constraints on transport models such as energy loss fluctuation and transverse-momentum broadening can further reduce theoretical uncertainties in the extracted transport coefficients.

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arXiv2017

Hadrons from Coalescence plus Fragmentation in AA collisions from RHIC to LHC energy

In a coalescence plus independent fragmentation approach we calculate the $p_T$ spectra of the main hadrons: $π, K, p, \bar p, Λ, ϕ$ in a wide range of transverse momentum from low $p_T$ up to about 10 GeV. The approach in its main features was developed several years ago at RHIC energy. Augmenting the model with the inclusion of some more main resonance decays, we show that the approach correctly predicts the evolution of the $p_T$ spectra from RHIC to LHC energy and in particular the baryon-to-meson ratios $p/π,\bar p/π,Λ/K$ that reach a value of the order of unit at $p_T \sim 3\, \rm GeV$. This is achieved without any change of the coalescence parameters. The more recent availability of experimental data up to $p_T \sim 10\rm\, GeV$ for $Λ$ spectrum as well as for $p/π$ and $Λ/K$ shows some lack of yield in a limited $p_T$ range around 6 GeV. This indicates that the baryons $p_T$ spectra from AKK fragmentation functions are too flat at $p_T\lesssim 8 \,\rm GeV$. We also show that in a coalescence plus fragmentation approach one predicts a nearly $p_T$ independent $p/ϕ$ ratio up to $p_T \sim 4 \rm\, GeV$ followed by a significant decrease at higher $p_T$. Such a behavior is driven by a similar radial flow effect at $p_T< 2 \,\rm GeV$ and the dominance of fragmentation for $ϕ$ at larger $p_T$.

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arXiv2017

Effect of pre-equilibrium phase on $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ of heavy quarks in heavy ion collisions

Heavy quark $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ have been calculated at RHIC energy considering initial conditions with and without pre-equilibrium phase to highlight the effect of the latter on heavy quark observables. The momentum evolution of the heavy quark has been studied by means of the Boltzmann transport equation. To model the pre-equilibrium phase we have used the KLN initial condition. We have found that the pre-equilibrium phase impacts the $R_{AA}$ of about 20-25 $\%$ whereas the impact on $v_2$ is very negligible. We have also calculated heavy quark $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ in the case of initializations with early thermalized quark-gluon plasma. We have checked that the particular form of the initial spectrum is not very important for $R_{AA}$, the larger energy density being more important. In fact, comparing the results obtained within the two initializations we have found that one can mimic the impact of the pre-equilibrium phase using a early thermalized QGP medium.

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arXiv2017

Estimating the Charm Quark Diffusion Coefficient and thermalization time from D meson spectra at RHIC and LHC

We describe the propagation of charm quarks in the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) by means of a Boltzmann transport approach. Non-perturbative interaction between heavy quarks and light quarks have been taken into account through a quasi-particle approach in which light partons are dressed with thermal masses tuned to lQCD thermodynamics. Such a model is able to describe the main feature of the non-perturbative dynamics: the enhancement of the interaction strength near $T_c$. We show that the resulting charm in-medium evolution is able to correctly predict simultaneously the nuclear suppression factor, $R_{AA}$, and the elliptic flow, $v_2$, at both RHIC and LHC energies and at different centralities. The hadronization of charm quarks is described by mean of an hybrid model of fragmentation plus coalescence and plays a key role toward the agreeement with experimental data. We also performed calculations within the Langevin approach which can lead to very similar $R_{AA}(p_T)$ as Boltzmann, but the charm drag coefficient as to be reduced by about a $30\%$ and also generates an elliptic flow $v_2(p_T)$ is about a $15\%$ smaller. We finally compare the space diffusion coefficient $2πTD_s$ extracted by our phenomenological approach to lattice QCD results, finding a satisfying agreement within the present systematic uncertainties. Our analysis implies a charm thermalization time, in the $p\rightarrow 0$ limit, of about $4-6 \, fm/c$ which is smaller than the QGP lifetime at LHC energy.

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arXiv2017

Directed Flow of Charm Quarks as a Witness of the Initial Strong Magnetic Field in Ultra-Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions

Ultra-relativistic Heavy-Ion Collision (HIC) generates very strong initial magnetic field ($\vec B$) inducing a vorticity in the reaction plane. The high $\vec{B}$ influences the evolution dynamics that is opposed by the large Faraday current due to electric field generated by the time varying $\vec{B}$. We show that the resultant effects entail a significantly large directed flow ($v_1$) of charm quarks (CQs) compared to light quarks due to a combination of several favorable conditions for CQs, mainly: (i) unlike light quarks formation time scale of CQs, $τ_f \simeq \, 0.1 \rm fm/c$ is comparable to the time scale when $\vec B$ attains its maximum value and (ii) the kinetic relaxation time of CQs is similar to the QGP lifetime, this helps the CQ to retain the initial kick picked up from the electromagnetic field in the transverse direction. The effect is also odd under charge exchange allowing to distinguish it from the vorticity of the bulk matter due to the initial angular momentum conservation; conjointly thanks to its mass, $M_c >>Λ_{QCD}$, there should be no mixing with the chiral magnetic dynamics. Hence CQs provide very crucial and independent information on the strength of the magnetic field produced in HIC.

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arXiv2017

Propagation of heavy baryons in heavy-ion collisions

The drag and diffusion coefficients of heavy baryons ($Λ_c$ and $Λ_b$) in the hadronic phase created in the latter stage of the heavy-ion collisions at RHIC and LHC energies have been evaluated recently. In this work we compute some experimental observables, such as the nuclear suppression factor $R_{AA}$ and the elliptic flow $v_2$ of heavy baryons at RHIC and LHC energies, highlighting the role of the hadronic phase contribution to these observables, which are going to be measured at Run 3 of LHC. For the time evolution of the heavy quarks in the QGP and heavy baryons in the hadronic phase we use the Langevin dynamics. For the hadronization of the heavy quarks to heavy baryons we employ Peterson fragmentation functions. We observe a strong suppression of both the $Λ_c$ and $Λ_b$. We find that the hadronic medium has a sizable impact on the heavy-baryon elliptic flow whereas the impact of hadronic medium rescattering is almost unnoticeable on the nuclear suppression factor. We evaluate the $Λ_c/D$ ratio at RHIC and LHC. We find that $Λ_c/D$ ratio remain unaffected due to the hadronic phase rescattering which enable it as a nobel probe of QGP phase dynamics along with its hadronization.

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arXiv2016

Heavy quark dynamics in QCD matter

Simultaneous description of heavy quark nuclear suppression factor $R_{AA}$ and the elliptic flow $v_2$ is a top challenge for all the existing models. We highlight how the temperature dependence of the energy loss/transport coefficients is responsible to address a large part of such a puzzle along with the the full solution of the Boltzmann collision integral for the momentum evolution of heavy quark. We consider four different models to evaluate the temperature dependence of drag coefficients of the heavy quark in the QGP. We have also highlighted the heavy quark dynamics in the presence of an external electromagnetic field which develops a sizable heavy quark directed flow, $v_1(y)$, can be measurable at LHC.

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arXiv2015

Initial state fluctuations from mid-peripheral to ultra-central collisions in a event-by-event transport approach

We have developed a relativistic kinetic transport approach that incorporates initial state fluctuations allowing to study the build up of elliptic flow $v_2$ and high order harmonics $v_3$, $v_4$ and $v_5$ for a fluid at fixed $η/s(T)$. We study the effect of the $η/s$ ratio and its T dependence on the build up of the $v_n(p_T)$ for two different beam energies: RHIC for Au+Au at $\sqrt{s}=200 \,GeV$ and LHC for $Pb+Pb$ at $\sqrt{s}=2.76 \,TeV$. We find that for the two different beam energies considered the suppression of the $v_n(p_T)$ due to the viscosity of the medium have different contributions coming from the cross over or QGP phase. Our study reveals that only in ultra-central collisions ($0 - 0.2 \%$) the $v_n(p_T)$ have a stronger sensitivity to the T dependence of $η/s$ in the QGP phase and this sensitivity increases with the order of the harmonic n. Moreover, the study of the correlations between the initial spatial anisotropies $ε_n$ and the final flow coefficients $v_n$ shows that at LHC energies there is more correlation than at RHIC energies. The degree of correlation increases from peripheral to central collisions, but only in ultra-central collisions at LHC, we find that the linear correlation coefficient $C(n,n) \approx 1$ for $n=2,3,4$ and $5$. This suggests that the final correlations in the ($v_n$,$v_m$) space reflect the initial correlations in the ($ε_n$,$ε_m$) space.

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arXiv2015

Toward a simultaneous description of $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ for heavy quarks

The two key observables related to heavy quarks that have been measured in RHIC and LHC energies are the nuclear suppression factor $R_{AA}$ and the elliptic flow $v_2$. Simultaneous description of these two observables is a top challenge for all the existing models. We have highlighted how a consistent combination of four ingredients i.e the temperature dependence of the energy loss, full solution of the Boltzmann collision integral for the momentum evolution of heavy quark, hadronization by coalescence, then the hadronic rescattering, responsible to address a large part of such a puzzle. We have considered four different models to evaluate the temperature dependence of drag coefficients of the heavy quark in QGP. All these four different models are set to reproduce the same $R_{AA}$ as of the experiments. We have shown that for the same $R_{AA}$, the $v_2$ could be quite different depending on the interaction dynamics as well as other ingredients.

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arXiv2015

Toward an understanding of the $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ puzzle for heavy quarks

One of the primary aims of the ongoing nuclear collisions at Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) and Large Hadron Collider (LHC) energies is to create a Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP). The heavy quarks constitutes a unique probe of the QGP properties. Both at RHIC and LHC energies a puzzling relation between the nuclear modification factor $R_{AA}(p_T)$ and the elliptic flow $v_2(p_T)$ related to heavy quark has been observed which challenged all the existing models.\\ We discuss how the temperature dependence of the heavy quark drag coefficient can address for a large part of such a puzzle. We have considered four different models to evaluate the temperature dependence of drag and diffusion coefficients propagating through a quark gluon plasma (QGP). All the four different models are set to reproduce the same $R_{AA}(p_T)$ experimentally observed at RHIC energy. We have found that for the same $R_{AA}(p_T)$ one can generate $2-3$ times more $v_{2}$ depending on the temperature dependence of the heavy quark drag coefficient.

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arXiv2015

Quarks Production in the Quark-Gluon Plasma Created in Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions

In this article we report on our results about quark production and chemical equilibration of quark-gluon plasma. Our initial condition corresponds to a classic Yang-Mills spectrum, in which only gluon degrees of freedom are considered; the initial condition is then evolved to a quark-gluon plasma by means of relativistic transport theory with inelastic processes which permit the conversion of gluons to $q\bar{q}$ pairs. We then compare our results to the ones obtained with a standard Glauber model initialization. We find that regardless of the initial condition the final stage of the system contains an abundant percentage of $q\bar{q}$ pairs; moreover spanning the possible coupling from weak to strong we find that unless the coupling is unrealistically small, both production rate and final percentage of fermions is quite large.

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arXiv2015

Toward a solution to the $R_{AA}$ and $v_2$ puzzle for heavy quarks

The heavy quarks constitutes a unique probe of the quark-gluon plasma properties. Both at RHIC and LHC energies a puzzling relation between the nuclear modification factor $R_{AA}(p_T)$ and the elliptic flow $v_2(p_T)$ has been observed which challenged all the existing models, especially for D mesons. We discuss how the temperature dependence of the heavy quark drag coefficient is responsible for a large part of such a puzzle. In particular, we have considered four different models to evaluate the temperature dependence of drag and diffusion coefficients propagating through a quark gluon plasma (QGP). All the four different models are set to reproduce the same $R_{AA}(p_T)$ observed in experiments at RHIC and LHC energy. We point out that for the same $R_{AA}(p_T)$ one can generate 2-3 times more $v_2$ depending on the temperature dependence of the heavy quark drag coefficient. A non-decreasing drag coefficient as $ T \rightarrow\ T_c \,$ is a major ingredient for a simultaneous description of $R_{AA}(p_T)$ and $v_2(p_T)$.

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arXiv2014

Heavy Flavor in Medium Momentum Evolution: Langevin vs Boltzmann

The propagation of heavy quarks in the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) has been often treated within the framework of the Langevin equation (LV), i.e. assuming the momentum transfer is small or the scatterings are sufficiently forward peaked, small screening mass $m_D$. We address a direct comparison between the Langevin dynamics and the Boltzmann collisional integral (BM) when a bulk medium is in equilibrium at fixed temperature. We show that unless the cross section is quite forward peaked ($m_D\cong T $) or the mass to temperature ratio is quite large ($M_{HQ}/T \gtrsim 8-10$) there are significant differences in the evolution of the $p-$spectra and consequently on nuclear modification factor $R_{AA}(p_T)$. However for charm quark we find that very similar $R_{AA}(p_T)$ between the LV and BM can be obtained, but with a modified diffusion coefficient by about $\sim 15-50\%$ depending on the angular dependence of the cross section which regulates the momentum transfer. Studying also the momentum spread suffered by a single heavy quarks we see that at temperatures $T\gtrsim \, 250\,\rm MeV$ the dynamics of the scatterings is far from being of Brownian type for charm quarks. In the case of bottom quarks we essentially find no differences in the time evolution of the momentum spectra between the LV and the BM dynamics independently of the angular dependence of the cross section, at least in the range of temperature relevant for ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions. Finally, we have shown the possible impact of this study on $R_{AA}(p_T)$ and $v_2(p_T)$ for a realistic simulation of relativistic HIC. For larger $m_D$ the elliptic flow can be about $50\%$ larger for the Boltzmann dynamics with respect to the Langevin. This is helpful for a simultaneous reproduction of $R_{AA}(p_T)$ and $v_2(p_T)$.

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arXiv2014

Thermalization, Isotropization and Elliptic Flow from Nonequilibrium Initial Conditions with a Saturation Scale

In this article we report on our results about the computation of the elliptic flow of the quark-gluon-plasma produced in relativistic heavy ion collisions, simulating the expansion of the fireball by solving the relativistic Boltzmann equation for the parton distribution function tuned at a fixed shear viscosity to entropy density ratio $η/s$. Our main goal is to put emphasis on the role of a saturation scale in the initial gluon spectrum, which makes the initial distribution far from a thermalized one. We find that the presence of the saturation scale reduces the efficiency in building-up the elliptic flow, even if the thermalization process is quite fast $τ_{therm} \approx 0.8 \,\rm fm/c$ and the pressure isotropization even faster $τ_{isotr} \approx 0.3 \,\rm fm/c$. The impact of the non-equilibrium implied by the saturation scale manifests for non-central collisions and can modify the estimate of the viscosity respect to the assumption of full thermalization in $p_T$-space. We find that the estimate of $η/s$ is modified from $η/s \approx 2/4π$ to $η/s \approx 1/4π$ at RHIC and from $η/s \approx 3/4π$ to $η/s \approx 2/4π$ at LHC. We complete our investigation by a study of the thermalization and isotropization times of the fireball for different initial conditions and values of $η/s$ showing how the latter affects both isotropization and thermalization. Lastly, we have seen that the range of values explored by the phase-space distribution function $f$ is such that at $p_T<0.5\, \rm GeV$ the inner part of the fireball stays with occupation number significantly larger than unity despite the fast longitudinal expansion, which might suggest the possibility of the formation of a transient Bose-Einstein Condensate.

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arXiv2014

Elliptic Flow and Shear Viscosity of the Shattered Color Glass Condensate

In this talk, we report on our results about the computation of the elliptic flow of the quark-gluon-plasma produced in relativistic heavy ion collisions, simulating the expansion of the fireball by solving the relativistic Boltzmann equation for the parton distribution function tuned at a fixed shear viscosity to entropy density ratio $η/s$. We emphasize the role of saturation in the initial gluon spectrum modelling the shattering of the color glass condensate, causing the initial distribution to be out of equilibrium. We find that the saturation reduces the efficiency in building-up the elliptic flow, even if the thermalization process is quite fast $τ_{therm} \approx 0.8 \,\rm fm/c$. and the pressure isotropization even faster $τ_{isotr} \approx 0.3 \,\rm fm/c$. The impact of the initial non-equilibrium manifests for non-central collisions and can modify the estimate of the viscosity respect to the assumption of full thermalization in $p_T$-space.

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arXiv2013

Heavy Flavor Suppression: Boltzmann vs Langevin

The propagation of heavy flavor through the quark gluon plasma has been treated commonly within the framework of Langevin dynamics, i.e. assuming the heavy flavor momentum transfer is much smaller than the light one. On the other hand a similar suppression factor $R_{AA}$ has been observed experimentally for light and heavy flavors. We present a thorough study of the approximations involved by Langevin equation by mean of a direct comparison with the full collisional integral within the framework of Boltzmann transport equation. We have compared the results obtained in both approaches which can differ substantially for charm quark leading to quite different values extracted for the heavy quark diffusion coefficient. In the case of bottom quark the approximation appears to be quite reasonable.

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arXiv2012

Shear viscosity and chemical equilibration of the QGP

We have investigated, in the frame work of the transport approach, different aspects of the QGP created in Heavy Ion Collisions at RHIC and LHC energies. The shear viscosity $η$ has been calculated by using the Green-Kubo relation at the cascade level. We have compared the numerical results for $η$ obtained from the Green-Kubo correlator with the analytical formula in both the Relaxation Time Approximation (RTA) and the Chapman-Enskog approximation (CE). From this comparison we show that in the range of temperature explored in a Heavy Ion collision the RTA underestimates the viscosity by about a factor of 2, while a good agreement is found between the CE approximation and Gree-Kubo relation already at first order of approximation. The agreement with the CE approximation supplies an analytical formula that allows to develop kinetic transport theory at fixed shear viscosity to entropy density ratio, $η/s$. We show some results for the build up of anisotropic flows $v_{2}$ in a transport approach at fixed shear viscosity to entropy density ratio, $η/s$. We study the impact of a T-dependent $η/s(T)$ on the generation of the elliptic flows at both RHIC and LHC. We show that the transport approach provides, in a unified way, a tool able to naturally describe the $v_{2}(p_{T})$ in a wide range of $p_{T}$, including also the description of the rise and fall and saturation of the $v_{2}(p_{T})$ observed at LHC. Finally, we have studied the evolution of the quark-gluon composition employing a Boltzmann-Vlasov transport approach that include: the mean fields dynamics, associated to the quasi-particle model, and the elastic and inelastic collisions for massive quarks and gluons. Following the chemical evolution from an initial gluon dominated plasma we predict a quark dominance close to $T_{C}$ paving the way to an hadronization via quark coalescence.

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