Heavy Flavor Theory in QCD Matter

HEFTY Summer School: June 24 - 26, 2024

HEFTY Collaboration Meeting: June 27 - 28, 2024

The investigation of the many-body physics of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) is a multifaceted challenge at the forefront of modern physics research. It encompasses such fundamental questions as how the structure of hadrons, the basic excitations of the QCD vacuum, emerges from the elementary quarks and gluons; how hadron masses, which account for the visible mass in the universe, are generated; and what mechanisms confine quarks and gluons into baryons and mesons. It also encompasses the question of the phase structure of QCD, i.e., how strongly interacting matter behaves when heated and/or compressed to extreme conditions of temperature and/or baryon density. High-temperature QCD matter filled the early universe in the first few microseconds of its existence, while matter at high-baryon density and relatively low temperature exists in the interior of neutron stars and affects their mergers. It is truly fascinating that, 14 billion years after the Big Bang, hot QCD matter akin to the early universe can be recreated, for a short moment, in the laboratory through collisions of heavy atomic nuclei at high energies. The open questions that the meeting will address include, but are not limited to:

• What are the transport properties of QCD matter and how do they emerge from the underlying interactions of quarks and gluons?
• What are the spectral functions of QCD matter and what can they tell us about the relevant degrees of freedom as the temperature of the QCD medium is varied?
• What are the mechanisms of converting quarks and gluons into hadrons?
• How do low momentum elastic interactions in QCD matter (diffusive regime) transition into inelastic reactions at high momentum (radiative regime)?
• What is the fate of jets in the QGP and in cold nuclear matter?
• What is the role and significance of quantum (off-shell) effects in the sQGP?

Focusing on heavy subatomic particles, the topic will be naturally organized in four categories:  properties of heavy subatomic particles in (I) hot QCD matter and (II) cold QCD matter; and specialized discussion of (III) open heavy flavor and (IV) quarkonia. 

Organizing Committee

Ivan Vitev    (LANL)

John Terry   (LANL)