https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/s10050-026-01897-2
Regular Article - Theoretical Physics
Coupled charm and charmonium transport in a strongly coupled quark–gluon plasma
1
Cyclotron Institute and Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas A&M University, 77843-3366, College Station, TX, USA
2
Department of Physics, Kent State University, 44242, Kent, OH, USA
a
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Received:
9
March
2026
Accepted:
6
June
2026
Published online:
2
July
2026
Abstract
The quark–gluon plasma (QGP) is a strongly coupled medium in which both open and hidden charm particles experience substantial nonperturbative interactions. This poses a major challenge for a quantitative description of charmonium transport in ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions, as it requires a mutually consistent treatment of pertinent transport coefficients. In this work, we present a coupled charm-charmonium transport framework for a strongly coupled QGP based on thermodynamic T-matrix interactions with recent constraints from Wilson-line correlators (WLCs) computed in lattice QCD. For the first time, the same underlying heavy-light interactions and in-medium spectral functions are used to self-consistently evaluate charm-quark diffusion and charmonium kinetics. In particular, the charmonium equilibrium limit, a critical transport parameter for regeneration, is evaluated in the presence of broad spectral functions. Charm-quark diffusion is simulated via Langevin dynamics and coupled to a Boltzmann equation for charmonium dissociation and regeneration. The equilibrium limit of the statistical model is recovered once charm quarks thermalize, and its extension to describe off-equilibrium is constructed. Preliminary applications to charmonium observables in Pb–Pb collisions at the LHC capture the measured centrality and momentum dependence fairly well.
Communicated by Che-Ming Ko.
© The Author(s) 2026
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