Enhancement of Elliptic Flow of π− under Intense Magnetic Field in √ sNN = 200 GeV Au+Au Collisions: A (2 + 1)-Dimensional Reduced-MHD Model Study

Abstract

We investigate the effect of intense magnetic fields on the ( 2 + 1 ) -dimensional reduced- magnetohydrodynamical (MHD) expansion of hot and dense quark–gluon plasma (QGP) produced in s NN = 200 GeV Au+Au collisions. For the sake of simplicity, we consider the case in which the magnetic field points in the direction perpendicular to the reaction plane. We also consider this field to be external, with energy density parametrized as a two-dimensional Gaussian. The width of the Gaussian along the directions orthogonal to the beam axis varies with the centrality of the collision. The dependence of the magnetic field on proper time ( τ ) is parametrized for the case of zero and finite electrical conductivity of the QGP. We solve the equations of motion of ideal hydrodynamics for such an external magnetic field. For collisions with a non-zero impact parameter we observe a considerable increase in the elliptic-flow coefficient v 2 of π − in the presence of an external magnetic field, and the increment in v 2 is found to depend on the evolution and the initial magnitude of the magnetic field.

Keywords

• relativistic magnetohydrodynamics
• quark–gluon plasma
• Au+Au collisions at RHIC