Speaker
Description
The possibility of Bose–Einstein condensation (BEC) of vector mesons provides an interesting avenue for exploring quantum phenomena in strongly interacting matter under extreme conditions. We investigate the condensation of $\rho$ (spin-1) mesons in a rotating hadronic medium, considering the substantial vorticity generated in non-central heavy-ion collisions. Rotation modifies the single-particle energy spectrum through its coupling to orbital and spin angular momentum and lifts the degeneracy among the three spin states. By considering a finite cylindrical system, we study the conditions for the onset of BEC of $\rho$ mesons and examine its dependence on temperature and rotation. We find that increasing the rotational strength enhances the condensation and modifies the critical temperature. At the same time, rotation redistributes the populations of the spin states, resulting in a preferential alignment of the ρ-meson spins along the rotation axis. We discuss the possible relevance of this spin-polarization signal for relativistic heavy-ion collisions, where it may be investigated through the angular distributions of dilepton decays of $\rho$ mesons. The results also have implications for dense, rapidly rotating astrophysical systems, where a spin-polarized $\rho$ condensed phase could modify the equation of state.