Colliding heavy ions: Nuclei as dynamical fluids

Abstract

Heavy ion experiments are already enriching nuclear science with a tapestry of new phenomena which require explanation. In response, theoretical nuclear physics is rapidly expanding its insights to encompass these new observations, especially those concerned with the macroscopic aspects. Preliminary theoretical studies already suggest that the dynamical nuclear fluid must sometimes be considered viscous, compressible, and/or rotational, if its microscopic properties are to be encompassed. These and some threads already well placed in the picture will be discussed. Other reasons will be cited to support the expectation that theoretical nulear macroscopists may more and more come to be fluid dynamicists who specialize in those few thousand fluids called nuclei. Three such reasons are (a) the promised richness of their structure as dynamical fluids, (b) their unique prospect, among all the objects of modern physical science, of allowing a complete microscopic, as well as a phenomenological macroscopic, description, and (c) the possible overflow of such nuclear implications into classical fluid theory, from the viewpoint of which the nuclear heavy ion data are a significant novelty.