The impact of nuclear deformation on relativistic heavy-ion collisions: assessing consistency in nuclear physics across energy scales

Abstract

In the hydrodynamic framework of heavy-ion collisions, elliptic flow, $v_2$, is sensitive to the quadrupole deformation, $\beta$, of the colliding ions. This enables one to test whether the established knowledge on the low-energy structure of nuclei is consistent with collider data from high-energy experiments. We derive a formula based on generic scaling laws of hydrodynamics to relate the difference in $v_2$ measured between collision systems that are close in size to the value of $\beta$ of the respective species. We validate our formula in simulations of 238U+238U and 197Au+197Au collisions at top Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) energy, and subsequently apply it to experimental data. Using the deformation of 238U from low-energy experiments, we find that RHIC $v_2$ data implies $0.16\lesssim |\beta |\lesssim 0.20$ for 197Au nuclei, i.e., significantly more deformed than reported in the literature, posing an interesting puzzle in nuclear phenomenology.

arXiv comment6 pages and 4 figures, published version

References in corpus (35)

• Collective flow and viscosity in relativistic heavy-ion collisions
• Tables of E2 Transition Probabilities from the first $2^{+}$ States in Even-Even Nuclei
• Structure of even-even nuclei using a mapped collective Hamiltonian and the D1S Gogny interaction
• Triangularity and Dipole Asymmetry in Heavy Ion Collisions
• Triangular flow in hydrodynamics and transport theory
• Event-by-event fluctuations in perturbative QCD + saturation + hydro model: pinning down QCD matter shear viscosity in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions
• Multi-system Bayesian constraints on the transport coefficients of QCD matter
• Non linearities in the harmonic spectrum of heavy ion collisions with ideal and viscous hydrodynamics
• Bayesian analysis of heavy ion collisions with the heavy ion computational framework Trajectum
• Phenomenological constraints on the transport properties of QCD matter with data-driven model averaging
• Global study of quadrupole correlation effects
• Improved version of the PHOBOS Glauber Monte Carlo
• Elliptic and triangular flow in p+Pb and peripheral Pb+Pb collisions from parton scatterings
• Conformal hydrodynamics in Minkowski and de Sitter spacetimes
• A transverse momentum differential global analysis of Heavy Ion Collisions
• Azimuthal anisotropy in U+U and Au+Au collisions at RHIC
• Anisotropic flow in Xe-Xe collisions at $\sqrt{{\mathbf{s}}_{\mathrm{NN}}}=5.44$ TeV
• Beyond Mean-Field Calculations for Odd-A Nuclei
• Hydrodynamic predictions for 5.44 TeV Xe+Xe collisions
• Thermodynamics of hot strong-interaction matter from ultrarelativistic nuclear collisions
• Parameterization of Deformed Nuclei for Glauber Modeling in Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions
• Relative flow fluctuations as a probe of initial state fluctuations
• Anisotropic flow and jet quenching in ultra-relativistic U+U collisions
• Long-range azimuthal correlations in proton-proton and proton-nucleus collisions from the incoherent scattering of partons
• Charged-particle angular correlations in XeXe collisions at $\sqrt{s_{{}_{\mathrm{NN}}}}=$ 5.44 TeV
• Constraining the quadrupole deformation of atomic nuclei with relativistic nuclear collisions
• Centrality fluctuations in heavy-ion collisions
• Measurements of directed, elliptic, and triangular flow in Cu$+$Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{{}_{NN}}}=200$ GeV
• Elliptic flow fluctuations in central collisions of spherical and deformed nuclei
• Global fluid fits to identified particle transverse momentum spectra from heavy-ion collisions at the Large Hadron Collider
• Multiparticle azimuthal cumulants in p+Pb collisions from a multiphase transport model
• Statistical theory of deformation distributions in nuclear spectra
• Elliptic Flow in Central Collisions of Deformed Nuclei
• Effective shear and bulk viscosities for anisotropic flow
• Centrality fluctuations and decorrelations in heavy-ion collisions