NPA Seminar, Jacquelyn Noronha-Hostler, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign , "From Little Bangs in the Laboratory to Neutron Star Mergers"
Unlike phase diagrams in condensed matter that can be probed in the laboratory, the Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) phase diagram can only be mapped out through both experiments and astrophysical phenomena. At low baryon densities and high temperatures it is explored both through the big bang and the little bangs produced in heavy-ion collisions. At large baryon densities, either low-energy heavy-ion experiments or neutron star mergers can be used to map out its potential phases.