Z0-tagged jet event asymmetry in heavy-ion collisions at the CERN large hadron collider.

Tagged jet measurements provide a promising experimental channel to quantify the similarities and differences in the mechanisms of jet production in proton-proton and nucleus-nucleus collisions. We present the first calculation of the transverse momentum asymmetry of Z0/γ*-tagged jet events in sqrt[s]=2.76 TeV reactions at the LHC. Our results combine the O(G(F)α(s)2) perturbative cross sections with the radiative and collisional processes that modify parton showers in the presence of dense strongly interacting matter. We find that a strong asymmetry is generated in central lead-lead reactions that has little sensitivity to the fluctuations of the underlying soft hadronic background. We present theoretical model predictions for its shape and magnitude.

Non-Abelian energy loss at finite opacity.

A systematic expansion in opacity, L/lambda, is used to clarify the nonlinear behavior of induced gluon radiation in quark-gluon plasmas. The inclusive differential gluon distribution is calculated up to second order in opacity and compared to the zeroth order (factorization) limit. The opacity expansion makes it possible to take finite kinematic constraints into account that suppress jet quenching in nuclear collisions below RHIC (square root of s = 200 AGeV) energies.

High p(T) azimuthal asymmetry in noncentral A + A at RHIC.

The high p(T)>3 GeV azimuthal asymmetry, v(2)(p(T)), in noncentral nuclear collisions at RHIC is shown to be a sensitive measure of the initial parton density distribution of the produced quark-gluon plasma. A generalization of the Gyulassy-Lévai-Vitev non-Abelian energy loss formalism including Bjorken (1+1)D expansion as well as important kinematic constraints is used.