Sprecher
Beschreibung
In heavy- and light-ion collisions, heavy quarks are produced in the initial hard scatterings, before the formation of the quark–gluon plasma (QGP). Nowadays there are strong indications for thermalization of charm quarks in the QGP evolution. The new light-ion data recorded at the LHC will help in understanding thermalization processes for heavy quarks and shed light on possible thermalization also in those smaller collision systems.
We present simulations of the evolution of charm quarks in oxygen–oxygen (O–O) collisions using two different approaches: a hydrodynamic description and a Langevin transport description. We further compare these results to simulations of charm quarks in lead–lead (Pb–Pb) collisions. From this comparison we obtain an estimate of the thermalization properties of charm quarks in O–O relative to Pb–Pb collisions, discuss their dependence on system size and temperature, and assess the applicability of a hydrodynamic description in the light-ion case.