Energy Loss Versus Energy Gain of Heavy Quarks in a Hot Medium

TL;DR

This paper investigates how heavy quarks lose or gain energy in a hot medium, revealing that energy gain can dominate at high temperatures, impacting interpretations of heavy ion collision experiments.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive study of heavy quark energy dynamics using Wong equations, including polarization and thermal fluctuation effects, which is novel in the field.

Findings

Heavy quark energy gain dominates at high temperatures.

Energy dynamics depend on temperature and momentum.

Results support recent experimental observations at RHIC and LHC.

Abstract

We study the energy loss and the energy gain of heavy quarks in a hot thermal medium. These include the study of the energy change due to the polarization and to the interaction with the thermal fluctuations of the medium. The dynamics of the heavy quarks with the medium is described by the Wong equations, that allow for the inclusion of both the backreaction on the heavy quarks due to the polarization of the medium, and of the interaction with the thermal fluctuations of the gluon field. Both the momentum as well as the temperature dependence of the energy loss and gain of charm and bottom quark are studied. We find that heavy quark energy gain dominate the energy loss at high-temperature domain achievable at the early stage of the high energy collisions. This finding supports the recently observed heavy quarks results in Glasma and will have a significant impact on heavy quark observables at RHIC and LHC energies.