Constraining models of initial conditions with elliptic and triangular flow data

Ekaterina Retinskaya (1) , Matthew Luzum (2, 3) , Jean-Yves Ollitrault (1)

1 IPHT - Institut de Physique Théorique - UMR CNRS 3681
2 LBNL - Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory [Berkeley]
3 McGill University = Université McGill [Montréal, Canada]

We carry out a combined analysis of elliptic and triangular flow data using viscous relativistic hydrodynamics. We show that these data allow to put tight constraints on models of the early dynamics of a nucleus-nucleus collision. Specifically, the rms values of the initial ellipticity $\varepsilon_2$ and the initial triangularity $\varepsilon_3$ are constrained to lie within a narrow band for each centrality. We use these constraints as a filter for existing Monte-Carlo models of initial state, and provide a simple test that can be performed on any candidate model to determine its compatibility with data.

Domaines: Physique Nucléaire Théorique [nucl-th]; Physique des Hautes Energies - Phénoménologie [hep-ph]; Physique Nucléaire Expérimentale [nucl-ex]

Ekaterina Retinskaya, Matthew Luzum, Jean-Yves Ollitrault. Constraining models of initial conditions with elliptic and triangular flow data. Physical Review C, 2014, 89 (1), pp.014902. ⟨10.1103/PhysRevC.89.014902⟩. ⟨cea-01326348⟩