On Signals of Quark-Gluon Plasma Freeze-Out

Abstract

The time-scales of rehadronization are considered for a baryon-free QGP at RHIC and LHC energies. The non-equilibrium nucleation scenario leads to mechanical instability of the supercooled QGP phase which then may be suddenly converted in a timelike deflagration from the supercooled state to a (super)heated hadronic matter. In a model simulation such a sudden process was indeed possible and satisfied energy and momentum conservation with non-decreasing entropy. It is possible to reach a hadronic state frozen out immediately after the timelike deflagration. If a TD leads to a simultaneous hadronization and freeze-out, the conditions of a pion-flash are satisfied. This rehadronization mechanism is signalled by a reduced difference between the sidewards and outward components of Bose-Einstein correlation functions, in the observation of the free masses of the resonances in the dilepton spectra and in a clean strangeness signal of the QGP.