Universal relations between nongaussian fluctuations in heavy-ion collisions

Abstract

We show that universality near a critical end point implies a characteristic relation between third- and fourth-order baryon susceptibilities $\chi_3$ and $\chi_4$, resulting in a banana-shaped loop when $\chi_4$ is plotted as a function of $\chi_3$ along a freeze-out line. Including the individual enhancements of $\chi_3$ and $\chi_4$ near a critical point, these features may be a consistent set of observations supporting the interpretation of baryon fluctuations data as arising from criticality.