Impact of nuclear deformation on collective flow observables in relativistic U+U collisions

TL;DR

This study uses the AMPT model and multiparticle azimuthal cumulants to assess how various flow observables can constrain the initial quadrupole deformation of uranium nuclei in relativistic U+U collisions at 193 GeV.

Contribution

It demonstrates that combining multiple flow observables can effectively constrain the nuclear quadrupole deformation in uranium nuclei.

Findings

Flow harmonics and fluctuations are sensitive to nuclear deformation.

Correlations between flow and transverse momentum can constrain shape deformation.

A comprehensive set of measurements can quantify nuclear quadrupole deformation.

Abstract

A Multi-Phase Transport (AMPT) model is used to investigate the efficacy of several flow observables to constrain the initial-state deformation of the Uranium nuclei in U$+$U collisions at nucleon-nucleon center-of-mass energy $\sqrt{\textit{s}_{NN}}$ = 193 GeV. The multiparticle azimuthal cumulant method is used to investigate the sensitivity of (I) a set of quantities that are sensitive to both initial- and final-state effects as well as (II) a set of dimensionless quantities that are more sensitive to initial-state effects to the Uranium nuclei quadrupole shape deformation. We find that the combined use of the flow harmonics, flow fluctuations and correlations, linear and non-linear flow correlations to the quadrangular flow harmonic, and the correlations between elliptic flow and the mean-transverse momentum could serve to constrain the nuclear deformation of the Uranium nuclei. Therefore, a comprehensive set of measurements of such observables can provide a quantifying tool for the quadrupole shape deformation via data-model comparisons.