Go with the Flow: Probing the Strongest Magnetic Field in the Universe

Abstract

Recent studies have predicted the extreme magnitudes of the electromagnetic fields generated in non-central heavy-ion collisions, as well as the effect they may have on collision-produced charged particles in terms of directed flow. Probing these fields would improve our ability to study the simultaneously produced quark-gluon plasma, a state of matter presumed to be one of the earliest forms in which our Universe existed. In this thesis, we develop two separate toy Monte Carlo simulations in order to predict the future measurability of this directed flow. We focus on √sNN = 5.02 TeV Pb+Pb collisions that are to take place during LHC Runs 2 & 3 at the ALICE experiment. Our results indicate that 30-50% central collisions should be most effective at demonstrating directed flow, from which discovery-level confidence could be obtained during LHC Run 3. Simplifying assumptions may impact the validity of our claims, yet they can still serve as a first-order estimation.