Survival of Back-to-Back Correlations for Finite Expanding Fireballs

Abstract

Back-to-Back Correlations (BBC) of particle-antiparticle pairs are predicted to appear if hot and dense hadronic matter is formed in high energy nucleus-nucleus collisions. The BBC correlations are related to in-medium mass-modification and squeezing of the quanta involved. The formalisms are analogous in the bosonic (bBBC) and in the fermionic (fBBC) cases. Both the bBBC and the fBBC are positive and unlimited correlations of similar strength. For testing the survival and the intensity of the effect in a more realistic situation, we study the back-to-back correlations for mass-modification occurring in a finite sized, thermalized medium. For illustration, we consider a non-relativistically expanding fireball with finite emission time. We show that the BBC signal indeed survives the expansion and flow effects, with sufficient magnitude to be observed at RHIC.