Dynamics of $K^{+}$ Production in Heavy Ion Collisions close to Threshold

Abstract

In this article the production of $K^{+}$ at energies close to the threshold is studied in detail. The production mechanisms, the influence of in-medium effects, cross sections, the nuclear equation of state and the dynamics of the nucleons on the kaon dynamics are discussed. A special regard will be taken on the collision of Au+Au at 1.5 GeV, a reaction that has recently been analyzed in detail by experiments performed by the KaoS and FOPI collaborations at the SIS accelerator at GSI.

extract from habilitation at Nantes university (France), 76 pages, 76 figures, ps-file about 6MB