Eur. Phys. J. C (2007) 49: 181-186
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-006-0127-0

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

Heavy quarks at RHIC from parton transport theory

¹ Physics Department, Purdue University, 525 Northwestern Ave, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA
² RIKEN BNL Research Center, Upton, NY, 11973-5000, USA

^* e-mail: molnar@physics.purdue.edu

Received: 18 August 2006
Published online: 2 December 2006

Abstract

There are several indications that an opaque partonic medium is created in energetic Au+Au collisions at the relativistic heavy ion collider (RHIC). At the extreme densities of ∼10–100 times normal nuclear density reached, even heavy-flavor hadrons are affected significantly. Heavy-quark observables are presented from the parton transport model MPC, focusing on the nuclear suppression pattern, azimuthal anisotropy (“elliptic flow”), and azimuthal correlations. Comparison with Au+Au data at top RHIC energy indicates significant heavy-quark rescattering, corresponding roughly five times higher opacities than estimates based on leading-order perturbative QCD. We propose measurements of charm–anticharm, e.g., D-meson azimuthal correlations as a sensitive, independent probe to corroborate these findings.