Chiral Transition in Nuclear Medium and Relevant Observables

Abstract

We discuss how the possible changes of hadron properties can be tested, associated with the chiral transition in nuclear medium; the hadrons discussed are the vector mesons,the $\sigma$ meson and the chiral partner of the nucleon. We emphasize that the proper quantity is the spectral function which describes the nuclear medium having a hadron; the analysis of electro-quasielastic reactions, for instance, has a relevance to the physics of CERES. The similarity is indicated between the physics discussed here with that of giant resonances. Experiments using nuclear targets are proposed to observe the $\sigma$ meson and to explore how the partial chiral restoration in nuclear medium manifests itself.