Hadron yields in Au+Au/Pb+Pb at RHIC and LHC from thermalized minijets

TL;DR

This paper models hadron yields at RHIC and LHC energies by assuming thermalization of minijets, linking pQCD energy densities with observed hadron multiplicities through entropy conservation.

Contribution

It introduces a method to connect perturbative QCD energy densities with final hadron yields using thermodynamical assumptions and accounts for nuclear shadowing effects.

Findings

Different shadowing parametrizations lead to significantly different energy density estimates.

The model successfully reproduces observed hadron multiplicities at chemical freeze-out.

Nuclear shadowing impacts the initial energy densities and subsequent hadron production.

Abstract

We calculate the yields of a variety of hadrons for RHIC and LHC energies assuming thermodynamical equilibration of the produced minijets, and using as input results from pQCD for the energy densities at midrapidity. In the calculation of the production of partons and of transverse energy one has to account for nuclear shadowing. By using two parametrizations for the gluon shadowing one derives energy densities differing strongly in magnitude. In this publication we link those perturbatively calculated energy densities of partons via entropy conservation in an ideal fluid to the hadron multiplicities at chemical freeze-out.