Charged- and Neutral-Particle Correlations at the Critical Point

Abstract

Motivated by the gas-liquid analog, a critical-point theory for charged multiplicities is generalized to describe the production of more than one type of final-state particle. The distribution in the total number is independent of the number of types created. As a specific application, a theory for charged and neutral particles results. It is found that the theory accounts for the observed linear rise of the mean number of neutrals $E\left\{n_0\right|n_{\mathrm{ch}}\}$ versus the number of charged particles $n_{\mathrm{ch}}$. An extension to neutral-$K$ production is given and it is found that $\frac{E\left\{n_K^0\right|n_{\mathrm{ch}}\}}{E\left\{n_0\right|n_{\mathrm{ch}}\}}$ is independent of $n_{\mathrm{ch}}$.