Imaging nuclei by smashing them at high energies: how are their shapes revealed after destruction?

High-energy nuclear collisions have recently emerged as a promising ‘imaging-by-smashing’ approach to reveal the intrinsic shapes of atomic nuclei. Here, I outline a conceptual framework for this technique, explaining how nuclear shapes are encoded during quark-gluon plasma (QGP) formation and evolution, and how they can be decoded from final-state particle distributions. I highlight the method’s potential to advance our understanding of both nuclear structure and QGP physics.