Oxygen collisions show evidence of early universe plasma state

Physicists at the STAR experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider have found strong evidence that colliding oxygen nuclei at nearly the speed of light generates a quark-gluon plasma, Phys.org reported. Quark-gluon plasma is a state of matter that existed immediately following the birth of the universe. The finding demonstrates jet quenching, where energetic particle jets lose energy as they pass through the dense medium. [1]

The experimental results were published in Physical Review Letters, according to Phys.org. High-energy jets of particles lose momentum while traversing the plasma created in the collisions, confirming a key predicted signature of the primordial state. Quark-gluon plasma reaches extreme temperatures of trillions of degrees, where subatomic particles move at speeds close to the velocity of light. [1][4]

As FTMQ Science reported earlier, researchers working at CERN previously observed individual quarks creating wakes and ripples inside quark-gluon plasma at the Large Hadron Collider. That earlier experiment established that the early universe state behaved like an ultra-low viscosity liquid rather than a conventional gas. [4]

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe by mass after hydrogen and helium, and it accounts for about 46.6 percent of the mass of Earth's crust. Inside atomic nuclei, bound protons and neutrons are held together before being disrupted in relativistic particle collisions. [3]