https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2006-10125-6
Dynamics and Thermodynamics with Nuclear Degrees of Freedom
Possible links between the liquid-gas and deconfinement-hadronization phase transitions
1
Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, J.W. Goethe Universität, Max-von-Laue Str. 1, D-60438, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
2
Kurchatov Institute, Russian Research Center, Kurchatov Sq. 1, 123182, Moscow, Russia
* e-mail: mishustin@fias.uni-frankfurt.de
Received:
14
March
2006
Accepted:
26
July
2006
Published online:
30
October
2006
It is commonly accepted that strongly interacting matter has several phase transitions in different domains of temperature and baryon density. In this contribution I discuss two most popular phase transitions which, in principle, can be accessed in nuclear collisions. One of them, the liquid-gas phase transition, is well established theoretically and studied experimentally in nuclear multifragmentation reactions at intermediate energies. The other one, the deconfinement-hadronization phase transition, is at the focus of present and future experimental studies with relativistic heavy-ion beams at SPS, RHIC and LHC. Possible links between these two phase transitions are identified from the viewpoint of their manifestation in violent nuclear collisions.
PACS: 12.38.Mh Quark-gluon plasma – / 12.39.-x Phenomenological quark models – / 25.70.Pq Multifragment emission and correlations – / 25.75.-q Relativistic heavy-ion collisions –
© Società Italiana di Fisica and Springer-Verlag, 2006