Abstract:
We calculate the Gaussian radius parameters
of the
pion-emitting source in high energy heavy ion
collisions,
assuming a first order phase transition from
a thermalized
Quark-Gluon-Plasma (QGP) to a gas of hadrons.
Such a model
leads to a very long-lived dissipative
hadronic rescattering
phase which dominates the properties of the
two-pion
correlation functions. The radii are found to
depend only
weakly on the thermalization time tau_i, the
critical
temperature T_c (and thus the latent heat),
and the specific
entropy of the QGP. The dissipative hadronic
stage enforces
large variations of the pion emission times
around the mean.
Therefore, the model calculations suggest a
rapid increase
of R_out/R_side as a function of K_T if a
thermalized QGP
were formed.