Single-particle and multiparticle analysis of nucleus-nucleus collisions at 14.6, 60, and 200 GeV/nucleon

Abstract
The angles of all charged secondaries have been measured in central collisions of O16 with AgBr at 14.6, 60, and 200 GeV per nucleon. The pseudorapidity distributions are approximately Gaussian in shape. The widths increase monotonically with beam energy, but are essentially independent of multiplicity at a fixed beam energy. Quantitatively, the widths are consistent with Landau’s hydrodynamical model and inconsistent with a spherical fireball model and with Bjorken’s hydrodynamical scaling model. There are no statistically significant correlations in the azimuthal angle of the observed charged secondaries. Analysis of the two-particle pseudorapidity correlation functions and of the pseudorapidity gap distributions provide no evidence of significant cluster production. The data are consistent with a Monte Carlo simulation based on independent emission of the secondary particles, although intrinsic few-particle correlations could be hidden by the high multiplicities in these events.