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HK: Fachverband Physik der Hadronen und Kerne

HK 6: Physik mit schweren Ionen

HK 6.5: Talk

Monday, March 10, 2008, 15:15–15:30, 2E

Dilepton production from an anisotropic quark-gluon plasma — •Mauricio Martinez¹ and Michael Strickland² — ¹Helmholtz Research School, Johann Wolfgang Goethe - Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany — ²Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, Johann Wolfgang Goethe - Universität Frankfurt,Frankfurt am Main, Germany

We calculate leading-order dilepton production resulting from the annihilation process qq→ l⁺ l⁻ from a quark-gluon plasma which has a time-dependent anisotropy in the momentum-space. A phenomenological model for the hard momentum scale, p_hard(τ) and the plasma anisotropy parameter, ξ(τ), is constructed. The model interpolates between free streaming behavior at early times and ideal hydrodynamical behavior at late times. Using this model, we show that for LHC energies, the medium dilepton production increases in the kinematic range 3 <p_T< 8 GeV. As a result this observable is sensitive to the isotropization time of the system, τ_iso.Therefore high-energy dilepton production can be used to probe the degree of momentum-space isotropy of a quark-gluon plasma produced in relativistic heavy ion collisions and the time of onset of hydrodynamic expansion of the QGP.