Isospin dependence of relative yields of $K^{+}$ and $K^0$ mesons at 1.528 AGeV

Abstract

Results on $K^{+}$ and $K^0$ meson production in ${}_{44}^{96}$Ru + ${}_{44}^{96}$Ru and ${}_{40}^{96}$Zr + ${}_{40}^{96}$Zr collisions at a beam kinetic energy of 1.528$A$ GeV, measured with the FOPI detector at GSI-Darmstadt, are investigated as a possible probe of isospin effects in high density nuclear matter. The measured double ratio ($K^{+}/K^0$)${}_{Ru}$/($K^{+}/K^0$)${}_{Zr}$ is compared to the predictions of a thermal model and a Relativistic Mean Field transport model using two different collision scenarios and under different assumptions on the stiffness of the symmetry energy. We find a good agreement with the thermal model prediction and the assumption of a soft symmetry energy for infinite nuclear matter while more realistic transport simulations of the collisions show a similar agreement with the data but also exhibit a reduced sensitivity to the symmetry term.

5 pages, 3 figures. accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. C

Cited by in corpus (2)

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