title: Kaon interferometry: a sensitive probe of the QCD equation of state?
abstract: We calculate the kaon-interferometry radius parameters for high-energy heavy-ion collisions, assuming a first-order phase transition from a thermalized quark-gluon plasma (QGP) to a gas of hadrons. At high transverse momenta K(T) approximately 1 GeV/c direct emission from the phase boundary becomes important; the emission duration signal, i.e., the R(out)/R(side) ratio, and its sensitivity to T(c) (and thus to the latent heat) are enlarged. The QGP+hadronic rescattering transport model calculations do not yield unusually large radii (R(i) < or = 9 fm). Finite-momentum-resolution effects have a strong impact on the extracted interferometry parameters ( R(i) and lambda), as well as on the ratio R(out)/R(side).
authors.affiliation: Nuclear Science Division 70-319, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, California 94720, USA.
authors.forename: Sven
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Soff
authors.forename: Steffen A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Bass
authors.forename: David H
authors.initials: DH
authors.lastname: Hardtke
authors.forename: Sergey Y
authors.initials: SY
authors.lastname: Panitkin