Elliptic flow of 𝜙 mesons as a sensitive probe for the onset of the deconfinement transition in high energy heavy-ion collisions

Abstract

The elliptic flow (v2) of φ mesons is shown to be a sensitive probe of the partonic collectivity using a multiphase transport (AMPT) model. Within the ambit of the AMPT model with partonic interactions (string melting version), the φ-meson v2 at midrapidity is found to have negligible contribution from hadronic interactions for Au + Au collisions at √sNN = 200 GeV. Changing the hadron cascade time in the model calculations does not change the φ-meson v2, while it reduces the v2 of protons at low transverse momentum (pT ). These observations indicate that a substantial reduction in φ-meson v2 as a function of colliding beam energy would suggest the dominance of hadronic interactions over partonic interactions.