Mainz 2022 – scientific programme

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SYPU: Symposium Plasmas in the Universe

SYPU 1: Plasmas in the Universe

SYPU 1.2: Invited Talk

Wednesday, March 30, 2022, 09:30–10:00, Audimax

The quark gluon plasma: from the laboratory to neutron stars — •Jan Steinheimer — FIAS, Frankfurt am Main

The Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP) is a state of matter that existed in the early universe and can only be created in relativistic collisions of heavy nuclei and possibly in the interior of neutron stars and their mergers. The QGP can be considered a color-plasma where the color charges are screened by the strong interaction (QCD) which allows them to move freely. Yet, due to the non-Abelian nature of QCD, and the fact that the force-carriers (Gluons) themselves carry a color charge, the process of the color screening in the QGP is not well understood. Current research on the QGP focusses on its thermodynamic properties as well quantities which may be related to its microscopic features like transport properties. There are still many open questions regarding the properties and especially phase structure of the QGP at large baryon densities in the context of recent astrophysical observations of neutron star mergers, which may probe yet unknown properties of the QGP. In this talk I will briefly review the main properties of the QGP and why it behaves differently than a QED plasma. I will summarize how QGP properties are extracted from high energy nuclear collisions. Finally, I will discuss how these findings can be related to matter found in the inside of neutron stars and especially in the violent mergers of such stars.