Tracking Heavy Quarks (IMAGE)

DOE/Brookhaven National Laboratory

Tracking Heavy Quarks

Caption

Collisions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) produce a hot soup of quarks and gluons (center)—and ultimately thousands of new particles. A new theory collaboration seeks to understand how heavy quarks (Q) and antiquarks (Q-bar) interact with this quark-gluon plasma (QGP) and transform into composite particles that strike the detector. Tracking these "heavy flavor" particles can help scientists unravel the underlying microscopic processes that drive the properties of the QGP.

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Brookhaven National Laboratory

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