Recent results from PHENIX on the evolution of hot QCD

Abstract

The Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider’s (RHIC) energy scan program explores the phase transition between the hadron gas and the quark gluon plasma phases by varying center-of-mass energies from √sNN = 7.7 to 200 GeV and using various system sizes. The nuclear modification factor of π0 and the azimuthal anisotropy of charged hadrons were measured in Au+Au collisions at c.m. energies √sNN = 39, 62.4 and 200 GeV. In addition, we present recent results of direct photon yield and anisotropy measurements in Au+Au collisions at c.m. energy √sNN = 200 GeV.