First mapping of the QCD critical surface in full (T, μ_B, μ_Q, μ_S) space via constant-entropy expansion gives a critical point at (114, 602) MeV in the pure baryon direction, with μ_B,c shifting 40-100 MeV in strangeness-neutral directions while remaining similar in charge-neutral ones.
Non-Monotonicity of Transverse Momentum Correlations in Au + Au Collisions at RHIC
3 Pith papers cite this work. Polarity classification is still indexing.
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abstract
Event-by-event transverse momentum correlations are sensitive to the equation of state of strongly interacting matter and are expected to exhibit anomalous fluctuations in the vicinity of the QCD critical point. We report the first measurements of two-particle transverse momentum ($p_T$) correlations for mid-rapidity charged particles in fixed-target Au+Au collisions at nucleon-nucleon center-of-mass energies $\sqrt{s_{NN}} = 3.0--7.7$ GeV, measured by the STAR experiment during the Beam Energy Scan (BES) Phase II program. The dependence of the scaled correlator on the number of participating nucleons ($N_{part}$) is studied to test expectations from an independent-source scenario, where the correlations are expected to scale as $1/\sqrt{N_{part}}$. We observe a clear breakdown of the expected scaling behavior in central collisions and identify a statistically significant non-monotonic dependence of the $p_T$ correlations on collision energy, with a significance of approximately $5\sigma$. In contrast, transport-model calculations and data from mid-central collisions yield significances of only $2\sigma$ and $1.4\sigma$, respectively, insufficient to support a claim of non-monotonicity. These observations provide new constraints on the equation of state at high baryon density and may be sensitive to the presence of a QCD critical point.
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2026 3representative citing papers
Including Fierz-complete four-quark interactions in fRG-QCD shifts the predicted critical endpoint to (T, μ_B) = (102, 647) MeV and slightly increases the phase boundary curvature to κ₂ = 0.0151, while confirming σ and π channels dominate except near the CEP.
A simplified model reproduces the observed non-monotonic pT correlation minimum via meson-baryon mixing, showing it is not a reliable signal for the QCD critical point.
citing papers explorer
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QCD critical surface from constant entropy contours
First mapping of the QCD critical surface in full (T, μ_B, μ_Q, μ_S) space via constant-entropy expansion gives a critical point at (114, 602) MeV in the pure baryon direction, with μ_B,c shifting 40-100 MeV in strangeness-neutral directions while remaining similar in charge-neutral ones.
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Fierz-complete four-quark interactions and the QCD phase diagram
Including Fierz-complete four-quark interactions in fRG-QCD shifts the predicted critical endpoint to (T, μ_B) = (102, 647) MeV and slightly increases the phase boundary curvature to κ₂ = 0.0151, while confirming σ and π channels dominate except near the CEP.
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Non-monotonicity of $p_T$ correlations from meson-baryon mixing
A simplified model reproduces the observed non-monotonic pT correlation minimum via meson-baryon mixing, showing it is not a reliable signal for the QCD critical point.