Abstract
We study the hadronization time of heavy quark in nuclear matter by using the coalescence model and the spatial diffusion constant of a heavy quark from lattice quantum chromodynamic calculations, assuming that the main interaction of a heavy quark at the critical temperature is hadronization. It is found that the hadronization time of a heavy quark is about for , if a heavy quark is combined with the nearest light antiquark in coordinate space without any correlation between the momentum of a heavy quark and that of a light antiquark which forms a heavy meson. However, the hadronization time reduces to for charm and for bottom, depending on the heavy meson radius, in the presence of momentum correlation. Considering the interspace between quarks and antiquarks at the critical temperature, it seems that the hadronization of a heavy quark does not happen instantaneously but gradually for a considerable time, if started from the thermal distribution of quarks and antiquarks.
- Received 20 January 2016
- Revised 8 June 2016
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.94.034901
©2016 American Physical Society