Universal properties of bulk viscosity near the QCD phase transition

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the bulk viscosity of quark-gluon matter near the QCD phase transition, revealing universal critical behavior and potential experimental signatures of the chiral critical point.

Contribution

It extends sum rule analysis to include light quark contributions and explores universal properties of bulk viscosity near second order phase transitions in QCD.

Findings

Bulk viscosity diverges at the Z(2) universality class critical point.

Universal critical behavior of bulk viscosity near second order phase transitions.

Possible experimental signatures of critical phenomena in heavy-ion collisions.

Abstract

We extract the bulk viscosity of hot quark-gluon matter in the presence of light quarks from the recent lattice data on the QCD equation of state. For that purpose we extend the sum rule analysis by including the contribution of light quarks. We also discuss the universal properties of bulk viscosity in the vicinity of a second order phase transition, as it might occur in the chiral limit of QCD at fixed strange quark mass and most likely does occur in two-flavor QCD. We point out that a chiral transition in the O(4) universality class at zero baryon density as well as the transition at the chiral critical point which belongs to the Z(2) universality class both lead to the critical behavior of bulk viscosity. In particular, the latter universality class implies the divergence of the bulk viscosity, which may be used as a signature of the critical point. We discuss the physical picture behind the dramatic increase of bulk viscosity seen in our analysis, and devise possible experimental tests of related phenomena.