Elliptic flow for φ mesons measured by PHENIX

Abstract

The systematic study of hadronic elliptic flow in various relativistic heavy ion collisions is important for the investigation of the initial geometry influence on the quark gluon plasma characteristics. The φ meson consists of strange and antistrange quarks and has a small interaction cross section with non-strange hadrons. Therefore, φ mesons are barely affected by late hadronic stage and reflect detailed information about hot and dense matter properties. Additionally, the comparison of elliptic flow for φ mesons to those of charged hadrons will provide additional information on the flavor dependence of flow. PHENIX has measured second order azimuthal anisotropy coefficients for φ mesons in Cu+Au collisions at √SNN = 200 GeV$\sqrt {{S_{NN}}} = 200\,{\rm{GeV}}$SNN=200 GeV and in U+U collisions at √SNN = 193 GeV$\sqrt {{S_{NN}}} = 193\,{\rm{GeV}}$SNN=193 GeV at midrapidity (| η | < 0.35). The obtained data suggest scaling of elliptic flow for φ mesons with eccentricity of participant nucleons in Cu+Au, U+U, and Au+Au collisions. Viscous hydrodynamic model iEBE-VISHNU provides a simultaneous description of the obtained data.