Near-threshold production of the multistrange Xi- hyperon.
The yield for the multistrange Xi(-) hyperon has been measured in 6A GeV Au+Au collisions via reconstruction of its decay products pi(-) and Lambda, the latter also being reconstructed from its daughter tracks of pi(-) and p. The measurement is rather close to the threshold for Xi(-) production and therefore provides an important test of model predictions. The measured yield for Xi(-) and Lambda are compared for several centralities. In central collisions the Xi(-) yield is found to be in excellent agreement with statistical and transport model predictions, suggesting that multistrange hadron production approaches chemical equilibrium in high baryon density nuclear matter.
Chung
P
P
Departments of Chemistry and Physics, SUNY at Stony Brook, New York 11794-3400, USA.
Ajitanand
N N
NN
Alexander
J M
JM
Anderson
M
M
Best
D
D
Brady
F P
FP
Case
T
T
Caskey
W
W
Cebra
D
D
Chance
J L
JL
Cole
B
B
Crowe
K
K
Das
A C
AC
Draper
J E
JE
Gilkes
M L
ML
Gushue
S
S
Heffner
M
M
Hirsch
A S
AS
Hjort
E L
EL
Holzmann
W
W
Huo
L
L
Issah
M
M
Justice
M
M
Kaplan
M
M
Keane
D
D
Kintner
J C
JC
Klay
J
J
Krofcheck
D
D
Lacey
R A
RA
Lauret
J
J
Lisa
M A
MA
Liu
H
H
Liu
Y M
YM
Milan
J
J
McGrath
R
R
Milosevich
Z
Z
Odyniec
G
G
Olson
D L
DL
Panitkin
S
S
Porile
N T
NT
Rai
G
G
Ritter
H G
HG
Romero
J L
JL
Scharenberg
R
R
Srivastava
B
B
Stone
N T B
NT
Symons
T J M
TJ
Taranenko
A
A
Whitfield
J
J
Wienold
T
T
Witt
R
R
Wood
L
L
Zhang
W N
WN
Oeschler
H
H