Coherent and chaotic generation of pions from relativistic heavy-ion collisions

Abstract
Based on the recent NA44 and WA98 two- and three-pion interferometry data together with the WA98 pion multiplicity information, we observe that the pions may be mostly emitted from chaotic sources in the peripheral events and coherent pions are mostly generated in the central events. A more refined analysis would be needed, however, to make our observation conclusive by quantifying various effects such as resonance formation of the emerging pions and also experimental uncertainties.