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How much do heavy quarks thermalize in a heavy ion collision?

  • McGill University
  • Stony Brook University

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

681 Scopus citations

Abstract

We investigate the thermalization of charm quarks in high-energy heavy-ion collisions. To this end, we calculate the diffusion coefficient in the perturbative quark gluon plasma and relate it to collisional energy loss and momentum broadening. We then use these transport properties to formulate a Langevin model for the evolution of the heavy quark spectrum in the hot medium. The model is strictly valid in the nonrelativistic limit and for all velocities γv<αs-1/2 to leading logarithm in T/mD. The corresponding Fokker-Planck equation can be solved analytically for a Bjorken expansion and the solution gives a simple estimate for the medium modifications of the heavy quark spectrum as a function of the diffusion coefficient. Finally we solve the Langevin equations numerically in a hydrodynamic simulation of the heavy-ion reaction. The results of this simulation are the medium modifications of the charm spectrum RAA and the expected elliptic flow v2(pT) as a function of the diffusion coefficient.

Original languageEnglish
Article number064904
JournalPhysical Review C - Nuclear Physics
Volume71
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 2005

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