"RHIC serves the perfect fluid" -- Hydrodynamic flow of the QGP

TL;DR

This paper discusses how the quark-gluon plasma created at RHIC behaves like an almost ideal fluid, providing evidence and insights into its transport properties through hydrodynamic flow analysis.

Contribution

It presents experimental evidence for the near-ideal fluid behavior of the QGP and explores how deviations at various conditions reveal its transport characteristics.

Findings

QGP behaves like an almost ideal fluid at RHIC.

Breakdown of ideal fluid behavior at high transverse momenta and other conditions.

Insights into the transport properties of the QGP.

Abstract

The bulk of the hot and dense matter created at RHIC behaves like an almost ideal fluid. I present the evidence for this and also discuss what we can learn about the transport properties of the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) from the gradual breakdown of ideal fluid dynamic behavior at large transverse momenta, lower beam energies, larger impact parameters, and forward rapidities.