Probing the nuclear symmetry energy with heavy-ion collisions

Heavy ion collisions (HICs) represent a unique tool to probe the in-medium nuclear interaction in regions away from saturation. In this review we present a selection of new reaction observables in dissipative collisions particularly sensitive to the symmetry term of the nuclear equation of state (Iso-EoS). We will first discuss the isospin equilibration dynamics. At low energies this manifests via the recently observed dynamical dipole radiation, due to a collective neutron-proton oscillation with the symmetry term acting as a restoring force. At higher beam energies Iso-EoS effects will be seen in an isospin diffusion mechanism, via imbalance ratio measurements, in particular from correlations to the total kinetic energy loss. For fragmentation reactions in central events we suggest to look at the coupling between isospin distillation and radial flow. In neck fragmentation reactions important Iso-EoS information can be obtained from the fragment isospin content, velocity and alignment correlations. The high-density symmetry term can be probed from isospin effects on heavy-ion reactions at relativistic energies ( few A GeV range), in particular for high transverse momentum selections of the reaction products. Rather isospin sensitive observables are proposed from nucleon/cluster emissions, collective flows and meson production. The possibility of shedding light on the controversial neutron/proton effective mass splitting in asymmetric matter is also suggested. A large symmetry repulsion at high baryon density will also lead to an 'earlier' hadron-deconfinement transition in n-rich matter. The binodal transition line of the (T, rho(B)) diagram is lowered to a region accessible through heavy-ion collisions in the energy range of the new planned facilities, e.g. the FAIR/NICA projects. Some observable effects of the formation of a mixed phase are suggested, in particular a neutron trapping mechanism. The dependence of the results on a suitable treatment of the isovector part of the interaction in effective QCD Lagrangian approaches is critically discussed. We stress the interest of this study in nuclear astrophysics, in particular for supernovae explosions and neutron star structure, where the knowledge of the Iso-EoS is important at low as well as at high baryon density. RI Baran, Virgil/A-8259-2011