Eur. Phys. J. A (2012) 48: 160
https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2012-12160-0

Review

Relativistic thermodynamics: Transverse momentum distributions in high-energy physics

UCT-CERN Research Centre and Department of Physics, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

^* e-mail: jean.cleymans@gmail.com

Received: 19 March 2012
Revised: 18 June 2012
Accepted: 24 June 2012
Published online: 27 November 2012

Abstract

Transverse momentum distributions measured by the STAR and PHENIX Collaborations at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider and by the ALICE, ATLAS and CMS Collaborations at the Large Hadron Collider can be considered in the framework of relativistic thermodynamics using the Tsallis distribution. Theoretical issues are clarified concerning the thermodynamic consistency in the case of relativistic high-energy quantum distributions. An improved form is proposed for describing the transverse momentum distribution and fits are presented together with estimates of the parameter q and the temperature T .