Open-charm meson elliptic flow measurement in Pb-Pb collisions at sqrt(sNN) = 2.76 TeV with ALICE at the LHC

TL;DR

This paper reports the measurement of elliptic flow (v2) of open-charm mesons in lead-lead collisions at the LHC, providing insights into charm quark thermalization and hadronization in quark-gluon plasma.

Contribution

First measurement of D meson elliptic flow in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV with detailed analysis and results from 2011 data.

Findings

D+ and D0 mesons exhibit significant elliptic flow

Results suggest partial thermalization of charm quarks

Insights into charm hadronization mechanisms

Abstract

A Large Ion Collider Experiment (ALICE) is one of the four large experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), and it is dedicated to the study of ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions, with the goal of investigating the properties of the high-density state of QCD matter produced in these collisions. The study of D meson production azimuthal anisotropy and the measurement of their elliptic flow (v2) can provide insight on the degree of thermalisation of charm quarks in the medium and on the charm hadronization mechanism. We present the measurement of the D+ and D0 meson v2 in Pb-Pb collisions at sqrt(sNN)=2.76 TeV at the LHC with ALICE. We discuss the details of the analysis and we show the results obtained from data samples collected in 2011.