Eur. Phys. J. C 22, 341-349 (2001)
DOI: 10.1007/s100520100787

Plasma production and thermalisation in a strong field

D.V. Vinnik¹, A.V. Prozorkevich², S.A. Smolyansky², V.D. Toneev³, M.B. Hecht⁴, C.D. Roberts⁴ and S.M. Schmidt<sup>1

1</sup>  Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 14, 72076 Tübingen, Germany
²  Physics Department, Saratov State University, 410071 Saratov, Russian Federation
³  Bogoliubov Laboratory of Theoretical Physics, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, 141980 Dubna, Russian Federation
⁴  Physics Division, Bldg 203, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL 60439-4843, USA

(Received: 27 July 2001 / Published online: 21 November 2001 - © Springer-Verlag / Società Italiana di Fisica 2001 )

Abstract
Aspects of the formation and equilibration of a quark-gluon plasma are explored using a quantum kinetic equation, which involves a non-Markovian, Abelian source term for quark and antiquark production and, for the collision term, a relaxation time approximation that defines a time-dependent quasi-equilibrium temperature and collective velocity. The strong Abelian field is determined via the simultaneous solution of Maxwell's equation. A particular feature of this approach is the appearance of plasma oscillations in all thermodynamic observables. Their presence can lead to a sharp increase in the time-integrated dilepton yield, although a rapid expansion of the plasma may eliminate this signal.

© Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag 2001