Eur. Phys. J. C (2009) 62: 139-144
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-009-1025-z

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

The theory and phenomenology of jets in nuclear collisions

¹ Theoretical Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, MS B238, Los Alamos, NM, 87545, USA
² Institute of Particle Physics, Hua-Zhong Normal University, Wuhan, 430079, China
³ Department of Physics, Columbia University, 538 West 120-th Street, New York, NY, 10027, USA

^* e-mail: ivitev@lanl.gov

Received: 30 September 2008
Revised: 5 February 2009
Published online: 8 April 2009

Abstract

We report selected results from a recent in-depth study of jet shapes and jet cross sections in ultra-relativistic reactions with heavy nuclei at the LHC. We demonstrate that at the highest collider energies these observables become feasible as a new, differential and accurate test of the underlying QCD theory. Our approach allows for detailed simulations of the experimental acceptance/cuts that help isolate jets emerging from a dense QGP. We show for the first time that the pattern of stimulated gluon emission can be correlated with a variable quenching of the jet rates and provide an approximately model-independent approach to determining the characteristics of the medium-induced bremsstrahlung spectrum. The connection between such cross section attenuation and the in-medium jet shapes is elucidated.