Baryon clustering at the critical line and near the hypothetical critical point in heavy-ion collisions

We study clustering of baryons at the freeze-out point of relativistic heavy-ion collisions. Using a Walecka-Serot model for the nucleon-nucleon (NN) interaction we analyze how the modified critical σ mode-responsible for the NN attraction- A llows for clustering of nucleons when the system is close to a possible critical point of QCD. We investigate clusters of few nucleons, and also the internal cluster configuration when the system is long lived. For realistic heavy-ion collisions we study to what extent light clusters, such as He4, can be formed in several fm/c, and perform the statistical analysis of proton cumulants and higher-order moments (skewness and kurtosis) for collisions at the beam energy scan of the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider.