Superposition models and the multiplicity fluctuations in heavy ion collisions

Abstract

A class of simple superposition models based on the Glauber picture of multiple collisions is compared with the data on the centrality dependence of the multiplicity distributions in a central rapidity bin. We show how the results depend on the specific assumptions concerning the distributions in the number of participants and their relations to the distributions of the number of produced hadrons in various phase space bins. None of the versions of the model describes satisfactorily the centrality dependence of the scaled dispersion.