First evidence for different freeze-out conditions for kaons and antikaons observed in heavy-ion collisions

Phys Rev Lett. 2003 Oct 10;91(15):152301. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.91.152301. Epub 2003 Oct 6.

Abstract

Differential production cross sections of K- and K+ mesons have been measured in Ni+Ni and Au+Au collisions at a beam energy of 1.5 A GeV. The K(-)/K(+) ratio is found to be nearly constant as a function of the collision centrality and system size. The spectral slopes and the polar emission pattern differ for K- and K+ mesons. These observations indicate that K+ mesons decouple earlier from the fireball than K- mesons.