Three-Particle Correlations from Parton Cascades in Au+Au Collisions

Ma, G. L.; Ma, Y. G.; Zhang, S.; Cai, X. Z.; Chen, J. H.; He, Z. J.; Huang, H. Z.; Long, J. L.; Shen, W. Q.; Shi, X. H.; Zhong, C.; Zuo, J. X.

Three-Particle Correlations from Parton Cascades in Au+Au Collisions

Authors

Description

We present a study of three-particle correlations among a trigger particle and two associated particles in Au + Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 200 GeV using a multi-phase transport model (AMPT) with both partonic and hadronic interactions. We found that three-particle correlation densities in different angular directions with respect to the triggered particle (`center', `cone', `deflected', `near' and `near-away') increase with the number of participants. The ratio of `deflected' to `cone' density approaches to 1.0 with the increasing of number of participants, which indicates that partonic Mach-like shock waves can be produced by strong parton cascades in central Au+Au collisions.
9 pages, 6 figures; Final version to appear in Physics Letters B