Elliptic flow from final state interactions in the distorted-wave emission-function model

Abstract

The effect of final state interactions on the elliptic flow coefficient measured in relativistic heavy ion collisions is investigated within the DWEF formalism established by Miller and Cramer [Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 102302 (2005), J. Phys. G34, 703 (2007), Phys. Rev. C78, 054905 (2008)]. It is found that the optical potential previously found to give the best fit of particle multiplicity and Hanbury Brown and Twiss radii in RHIC events has a moderate effect on the resulting elliptic flow coefficient v_2. This indicates that final state interactions should be taken into account to confidently predict v_2 to better than ~20% accuracy.

17 pages, 2 figures; v2: replaced all figures, revised Results section, changed title to match published version, and other minor changes