The quark condensate in relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions

We compute the modification of the quark condensate [(q) over bar q] in relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions and estimate the 4-volume, where tie quark condensate is small ([(q) over bar q]/[(q) over bar q](0) less than or equal to 0.1-0.3) using hadron phase-space distributions obtained with the quark-gluon string model. As a function of the beam energy the 4-volume rises sharply at a beam energy E-lab/A similar or equal to (2-5) GeV, remains roughly constant up to beam energies similar or equal to 20 GeV and rises at higher energies. At low energies the reduction of the condensate is mainly due to baryons, while at higher energies the rise of the 4-volume is due to the abundant mesons produced. Based on our results we expect that moderate beam energies on the order of 10 GeV pfr nucleon art favourable for studying the restoration of chiral symmetry in a baryon-rich environment in nucleus-nucleus collisions.