Photons from Nucleus-Nucleus Collisions at Ultra-Relativistic Energies

Abstract

We compare the photon emission rates from hot hadronic matter with in-medium mass shift and Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP). It is observed that the WA98 data can be well reproduced by hadronic initial state with initial temperature $\sim 200$ MeV if the universal scaling of temperature dependent hadronic masses are assumed and the evolution of temperature with time is taken from transport model or (3+1) dimensional hydrodynamics. The data can also be reproduced by QGP initial state with similar initial temperature and non-zero initial radial velocity.

Comments: Talk given in the International Nuclear Physics Conference, at the University of California, Berkeley, USA, during July 30 - August 3, 2001