Locating the QCD critical end point through peaked baryon number susceptibilities along the freeze-out line

We investigate the baryon number susceptibilities up to fourth order along different freeze-out lines in a holographic QCD model with a critical end point（CEP）, and we propose that the peaked baryon number susceptibilities along the freeze-out line can be used as a clean signature to locate the CEP in the QCD phase diagram.On the temperature and baryon chemical potential plane, the cumulant ratio of the baryon number susceptibilities（up to fourth order） forms a ridge along the phase boundary, and develops a sword-shaped ＂mountain＂ standing upright around the CEP in a narrow and oblate region. The measurement of baryon number susceptibilities from heavy-ion collision experiments is along the freeze-out line. If the freeze-out line crosses the foot of the CEP mountain, then one can observe the peaked baryon number susceptibilities along the freeze-out line, and the kurtosis of the baryon number distributions has the highest magnitude. The data from the first phase of the beam energy scan program at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider indicates that there should be a peak of the kurtosis of the baryon number distribution at a collision energy of around 5 Ge V, which suggests that the freeze-out line crosses the foot of the CEP mountain and the summit of the CEP should be located nearby, around a collision energy of 3–7 GeV.

Reconstruction of baryon number distributions

The maximum entropy method(MEM)and Gaussian process(GP)regression,which are both well-suited for the treatment of inverse problems,are used to reconstruct net-baryon number distributions based on a finite number of cumulants of the distribution.Baryon number distributions across the chiral phase transition are reconstructed.It is deduced that with the increase of the order of cumulants,distribution in the long tails,i.e.,far away from the central number,would become increasingly important.We also reconstruct the distribution function based on the experimentally measured cumulants at the collision energy sNN−−−√=7.77 GeV.Given the sizable error of the fourth-order cumulant measured in the experiments,the calculation of MEM shows that with the increasing fourth-order cumulant,there is another peak in the distribution function developed in the region of the large baryon number.This unnaturalness observed in the reconstructed distribution function could in turn be used to constrain the cumulants measured in the experiments.