Relativistic Heavy Ion Physics

该奖项将支持对极端相对论原子核之间碰撞的研究，最终导致在广泛的温度和密度范围内确定核物质的性质和状态方程。高能量密度物理是一个迅速发展的领域，它跨越了包括核物理、等离子体物理、激光物理、流体力学和磁流体动力学在内的广泛的物理子学科。来自新的地球和轨道观测站的天体物理学成果使人们能够通过研究巨行星、棕矮星、白矮星、中子星、超新星、伽马射线爆发和大爆炸，在恒星、银河和宇宙尺度上研究高能量密度物理。这一相对论核-核碰撞奖支持的研究探索了高能密度物理相空间的高温区，在那里存在从强子到部分子物质的转变，即夸克-胶子等离子体(QGP)。虽然致密的夸克物质显然是在相对论重离子碰撞的早期阶段产生的，但识别相变边界将需要一套全面和相关的测量碰撞观测数据，以及与核物质参数相关的实际和广泛的计算。在接下来的三年里，工作重点将集中在长岛布鲁克海文国家实验室(BNL)相对论重离子对撞机(RHIC)的螺线管跟踪器(STAR)实验中获取、分析和解释数据。以及瑞士日内瓦欧洲核子研究中心(CERN)大型强子对撞机(LHC)的紧凑型Muon螺线管(CMS)实验。初级科学家也将以重要的方式参与这项研究。

This award will support the study of collisions between ultra-relativistic nuclei, ultimately leading to a determination of the properties and of the equation of state of nuclear matter over a wide range of temperatures and densities. High energy density physics is a rapidly growing field that spans a broad range of physics sub-disciplines including nuclear physics, plasma physics, laser physics, fluid dynamics, and magnetohydrodynamics. The astrophysics results from new terrestrial and orbital observatories have enabled study of high energy density physics on the stellar, galactic, and universal scales through the study of giant planets, brown dwarfs, white dwarfs, neutron stars, supernovae, gamma-ray bursters, and the big bang. The studies supported by this award of relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions probe the high-temperature region of high energy density physics phase space, where there is a transition from hadron to partonic matter, the quark-gluon plasma (QGP). Although it is clear that dense quark matter is created in the early stages of relativistic heavy-ion collisions, identification of the phase transition boundary will require a comprehensive and correlated set of measured collision observables, as well as, realistic and extensive calculations which relate the observables to nuclear matter parameters.For the next three years, efforts will be focused on the acquisition, analysis, and interpretation of data taken with the Solenoidal Tracker At RHIC (STAR) experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) on Long Island, and the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland. Junior scientists will also participate in an essential way in this research.