Melting Upsilon (IMAGE)
Caption
In the presence of quark-gluon plasma (background), free quarks and gluons can get in the way of the interaction between the bottom quark and antibottom quark that make up an upsilon. This screening of the quark-antiquark interaction causes the upsilon to dissociate, or melt. The data show that loosely bound upsilons melt most easily, while the tightly bound ground state melts the least.
Credit
Brookhaven National Laboratory
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