Is $K_1/K^{\ast }$ enhancement in heavy ion collisions a signature of chiral symmetry restoration?

Abstract

We extend the recent study of $K_1/K^{\ast }$ enhancement as a signature of chiral symmetry restoration in heavy ion collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) via the kinetic approach to include the effects due to non-unity hadron fugacities during the evolution of produced hadronic matter and the temperature-dependent $K_1$ mass. Although the effect of non-unity fugacity only slightly reduces the $K_1/K^{\ast }$ enhancement due to chiral symmetry restoration, the inclusion of the temperature-dependent $K_1$ mass leads to a substantial reduction in the $K_1/K^{\ast }$ enhancement. However, the final $K_1/K^{\ast }$ ratio in peripheral collisions still shows a more than factor of two enhancement compared to the case without chiral symmetry restoration and thus remains a good signature for chiral symmetry restoration in the hot dense matter produced in relativistic heavy ion collisions.

Comments: 5 pages with 5 figures