The effect of shear and bulk viscosities on elliptic flow

Abstract

In this work, we examine the effect of shear and bulk viscosities on elliptic flow by taking a realistic parameterization of the shear and bulk viscous coefficients, $η$ and $ζ$, and their respective relaxation times, $τ_π$ and $τ_Π$. We argue that the behaviors close to ideal fluid observed at RHIC energies may be related to non-trivial temperature dependence of these transport coefficients.

6 pages, 4 figures, to appear in the proceedings of Strange Quark Matter 2009 (SQM09)