We study the role of dynamic pairing correlations in fission dynamics by considering intrinsic Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov wave functions that are obtained by minimizing the particle number projected energy. For the restricted variational space, the set of self-consistent wave functions with different values of proton and neutron number particle fluctuations are considered. The particle number projected energy is used to define the potential energy surface for fission whereas collective inertias are computed within the traditional formulas for the intrinsic states. The results show that the effect of the restricted variation after particle number projection in the potential energy surface is small while collective inertias substantially decrease. On the other hand, we show that this quenching is strongly mitigated when Coulomb antipairing is considered and therefore the final outcome of the complete calculation is close to the plain mean field result without Coulomb antipairing. In the light of these beyond-mean-field calculations, the validity of traditional fission calculations is discussed.

Background: Levels fulfilling the seniority scheme and relevant isomers are commonly observed features in semimagic nuclei; for example, in Sn isotopes ($Z=50$). Seniority isomers in Sn, with dominantly pure neutron configurations, directly probe the underlying neutron-neutron ($\nu \nu$) interaction. Furthermore, an addition of a valence proton particle or hole, through neutron-proton ($\nu \pi$) interaction, affects the neutron seniority as well as the angular momentum.

Purpose: Benchmark the reproducibility of the experimental observables, like the excitation energies ($E_X$) and the reduced electric-quadrupole transition probabilities $\left[B\right(E2\left)\right]$, with the results obtained from shell-model interactions for neutron-rich Sn and Sb isotopes with $N<82$. Study the sensitivity of the aforementioned experimental observables to the model interaction components. Furthermore, explore from a microscopic point of view the structural similarity between the isomers in Sn and Sb, and thus the importance of the valence proton.

Methods: The neutron-rich ${}^{122}{}_{–}{}^{131}\mathrm{Sb}$ isotopes were produced as fission fragments in the reaction ${}^9\mathrm{Be}\left({}^{238}\mathrm{U}, f\right)$ with 6.2 MeV/u beam energy. A unique setup, consisting of AGATA, VAMOS++, and EXOGAM detectors, was used which enabled the prompt-delayed $\gamma$-ray spectroscopy of fission fragments in the time range of 100 ns to $200\mu \mathrm{s}$.

Results: New isomers and prompt and delayed transitions were established in the even-$A$ ${}^{122}{}_{–}{}^{130}\mathrm{Sb}$ isotopes. In the odd-$A$ ${}^{123}{}_{–}{}^{131}\mathrm{Sb}$ isotopes, new prompt and delayed $\gamma$-ray transitions were identified, in addition to the confirmation of the previously known isomers. The half-lives of the isomeric states and the $B\left(E2\right)$ transition probabilities of the observed transitions depopulating these isomers were extracted.

Conclusions: The experimental data was compared with the theoretical results obtained in the framework of large-scale shell-model (LSSM) calculations in a restricted model space. Modifications of several components of the shell-model interaction were introduced to obtain a consistent agreement with the excitation energies and the $B\left(E2\right)$ transition probabilities in neutron-rich Sn and Sb isotopes. The isomeric configurations in Sn and Sb were found to be relatively pure. Furthermore, the calculations revealed that the presence of a single valence proton, mainly in the $g_{7/2}$ orbital in Sb isotopes, leads to significant mixing (due to the $\nu \pi$ interaction) of (i) the neutron seniorities (${\upsilon }_{\nu }$) and (ii) the neutron angular momentum ($I_{\nu }$). The above features have a weak impact on the excitation energies, but have an important impact on the $B\left(E2\right)$ transition probabilities. In addition, a constancy of the relative excitation energies irrespective of neutron seniority and neutron number in Sn and Sb was observed.

Isochronous mass spectrometry has been applied in the storage ring CSRe to measure the masses of the neutron-rich ${}^{52–54}\mathrm{Sc}$ and ${}^{54,56}\mathrm{Ti}$ nuclei. The new mass excess values $ME\left({}^{52}\mathrm{Sc}\right)=-40525\left(65\right)$ keV, $ME\left({}^{53}\mathrm{Sc}\right)=-38910\left(80\right)$ keV, and $ME\left({}^{54}\mathrm{Sc}\right)=-34485\left(360\right)$ keV, deviate from the Atomic Mass Evaluation 2012 by $2.3\sigma , 2.8\sigma$, and $1.7\sigma$, respectively. These large deviations significantly change the systematics of the two-neutron separation energies of scandium isotopes. The empirical shell gap extracted from our new experimental results shows a significant subshell closure at $N=32$ in scandium, with a similar magnitude as in calcium. Moreover, we present ab initio calculations using the valence-space in-medium similarity renormalization group based on two- and three-nucleon interactions from chiral effective field theory. The theoretical results confirm the existence of a substantial $N=32$ shell gap in Sc and Ca with a decreasing trend towards lighter isotones, thus providing a consistent picture of the evolution of the $N=32$ magic number from the $pf$ into the $sd$ shell.

We perform systematic calculations regarding the effects by Coulomb and/or spin-orbit (SO) interaction on like- and unlike-pairing correlations in $sd$-, $pf$-, and $sdgh$-shell $N=Z$ nuclei. The former two interactions are comprised in a deformed mean-field potential and the latter pairing correlations are treated by residual interactions in the mean field. We make use of two different pairing matrix elements (PMEs) for the residual interactions : constant and state-dependent Brueckner $G$ matrix. The constant PME may give rise to meaningful information on the pairing correlations under the Wigner spin-isospin SU(4) symmetry in the absence of the Coulomb and the SO interaction. The state-dependent Brueckner PME takes into account the nuclear medium effect based on a realistic nucleon-nucleon interaction. In this work, through the analyses of the Coulomb and the SO interaction effects on the pairing correlations, we discuss in detail the isoscalar pair condensation and the coexistence of the isoscalar and the isovector pairs in the unlike pairing of the $N=Z$ nuclei. Our results show that the Coulomb and the SO interaction as well as nuclear deformation affect the single-particle state evolution in a deformed mean field and, as a result, give significant impacts on the pairing correlations and the smearing of occupation probabilities near Fermi energy. In particular, the pairing gaps in the heavy nuclei are largely disturbed by the Coulomb interaction as well as the SO interaction.

$\alpha$ elastic and inelastic scattering on ${}^{12}\mathrm{C}$ is investigated with the coupled-channels calculation by using microscopic $\alpha -{}^{12}\mathrm{C}$ potentials, which are derived by folding the Melbourne $g$-matrix $NN$ interaction with the densities of $\alpha$ and ${}^{12}\mathrm{C}$. The matter and transition densities of ${}^{12}\mathrm{C}$ are obtained by a microscopic structure model of the antisymmetrized molecular dynamics combined with and without the $3\alpha$ generator coordinate method. The calculation reproduces satisfactorily well the observed elastic and inelastic cross sections at incident energies of $E_{\alpha }=130$, 172.5, 240, and 386 MeV without phenomenological fitting parameters adjusted to hadron scattering reactions. Isoscalar monopole and dipole excitations to the $0_2^{+}, 0_3^{+}$, and $1_1^{-}$ states in the $\alpha$ scattering are discussed.

The $\gamma$-strength functions and level densities in the quasicontinuum of ${}^{147,149}\mathrm{Sm}$ isotopes have been extracted from particle-$\gamma$ coincidences using the Oslo method. The nuclei of interest were populated via $(p,d)$ reactions on pure ${}^{148,150}\mathrm{Sm}$ targets and the reaction products were recorded by the Hyperion array. An upbend in the low-energy region of the $\gamma \mathrm{SF}$ has been observed. The systematic analysis of the $\gamma \mathrm{SF}$ for a range of Sm isotopes highlights the interplay between scissors mode and the upbend. Shell-model calculations show reasonable agreement with the experimental $\gamma \mathrm{SFs}$ and confirm the correspondence between the upbend and scissors mode.

The structure of low-spin states originating from shape-coexisting configurations in ${}_{40}{}^{68}\mathrm{Ni}_{28}$ was directly probed via the two-neutron transfer reaction ${}^{66}\mathrm{Ni}(t,p){}^{68}\mathrm{Ni}$ in inverse kinematics using a radioactive ion beam on a radioactive target. The direct feeding to the first excited $0^{+}$ state was measured for center-of-mass angles $4^{\circ }–{16}^{\circ }$ and amounts to an integral of 4.2(16)% relative to the ground state. The observed difference in feeding of the $0^{+}$ states is explained by the transfer of neutrons, mainly in the $pf$ shell below $N=40$ for the ground state, and across $N=40$ in the $g_{9/2}$ orbital for the $0_2^{+}$, based on second-order distorted-wave Born approximation calculations combined with state-of-the-art shell-model two-nucleon amplitudes. However, the direct feeding to the $2_1^{+}$ state [29(3)%] is incompatible with these calculations.

The possibilities for production of yet unknown neutron-rich isotopes ${}^{261–265}\mathrm{Md}$ are explored in the multinucleon transfer reactions with stable beams bombarding on Cf and Es targets. The production of a given isotope of neutron-rich Md is optimized by appropriate choices of projectile-target combinations and bombarding energies. The production cross sections of neutron-rich Md isotopes in the $0n$ and $1n$ evaporation channels of multinucleon transfer reactions are compared. The prospects for the use of radioactive beams in the production of new Md isotopes are discussed.

The inverse kinematics technique, applied to radioactive beams and combined to the Coulomb excitation method, is a powerful tool to study low-energy fission. A novel experimental setup was developed within the R3B/SOFIA (Reactions with Relativistic Radioactive Beams/Studies On FIssion with Aladin) collaboration to identify in mass and atomic numbers both fission fragments in coincidence. These new data provide elemental, isobaric, and isotonic yields for the fission along the thorium isotopic chain. Results are also compared to previous measurements using either the same reaction mechanism or thermal-neutron induced fission. This latter comparison permits to probe the influence of the excitation energy in the fission process.

Background: The presolar grains originating in oxygen-neon novae may be identified more easily than those of other stellar sources if their sulfur isotopic ratios (${}^{33}\mathrm{S}/{}^{32}\mathrm{S}$ and ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}/{}^{32}\mathrm{S}$) are compared with the theoretical ones. The accuracy of such a comparison depends on reliable ${}^{33}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{34}\mathrm{Cl}$ and ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ reaction rates at the nova temperature regime. The latter rate has recently been computed based on experimental input, and many new excited states in ${}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ were discovered above the proton threshold. As a result, the experimental ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ rate was found to be less uncertain and 2–5 times smaller than the theoretical one. Consequently, the simulated ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}/{}^{32}\mathrm{S}$ isotopic ratio for nova presolar grains was predicted to be smaller than that of type II supernova grains by a factor of 1.5 to 3.7.

Purpose: The present study was performed to confirm the existence of these new resonances, and to improve the remaining uncertainties in the ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ reaction rate.

Methods: Energies and spin-parities of the ${}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ excited levels were investigated via high-resolution charged-particle spectroscopy with an Enge split-pole spectrograph using the ${}^{32}\mathrm{S}(\alpha ,p){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ reaction. Differential cross sections of the outgoing protons were measured at $E_{\alpha }=21$ MeV. Distorted-wave Born approximation calculations were carried out to constrain the spin-parity assignments of observed levels, with special attention to those significant in determination of the ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ reaction rate over the nova temperature regime.

Results: The existence of these newly discovered states are largely confirmed, although a few states were not observed in this study. The spins and parities of a few ${}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ states were assigned tentatively for the first time.

Conclusions: The present ${}^{34}\mathrm{S}(p,\gamma ){}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$ experimental thermonuclear reaction rate at 0.1–0.4 GK is consistent within $1\sigma$ with the previous evaluation. However, our rate uncertainty is larger than before due to a more realistic treatment of the uncertainties in the rate input. In comparison with the previous rate evaluation, where the high and low rates differed by less than a factor of 2 over the nova temperature regime, the ratio of the present limit rates is at most a factor of 3.5 at 0.12 GK. At temperatures above 0.2 GK, we recommend the future work to focus on determination of the unknown properties of four excited states of ${}^{35}\mathrm{Cl}$: 6643, 6761, 6780, and 6800 keV.

Particle-$\gamma$ coincidence experiments were performed at the Oslo Cyclotron Laboratory with the ${}^{181}\mathrm{Ta}(d,X)$ and ${}^{181}\mathrm{Ta}({}^3\mathrm{He},X)$ reactions to measure the nuclear level densities (NLDs) and $\gamma$-ray strength functions ($\gamma \mathrm{SFs}$) of ${}^{180,181,182}\mathrm{Ta}$ using the Oslo method. The back-shifted Fermi-gas, constant temperature plus Fermi gas, and Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov plus combinatorial models were used for the absolute normalizations of the experimental NLDs at the neutron separation energies. The NLDs and $\gamma \mathrm{SFs}$ are used to calculate the corresponding ${}^{181}\mathrm{Ta}(n,\gamma )$ cross sections and these are compared to results from other techniques. The energy region of the scissors resonance strength is investigated and from the data and comparison to prior work it is concluded that the scissors strength splits into two distinct parts. This splitting may allow for the determination of triaxiality and a $\gamma$ deformation of $14.9^{\circ }\pm 1.8^{\circ }$ was determined for ${}^{181}\mathrm{Ta}$.

Particles produced in heavy ion collisions carry information about anisotropies present already in the early state of the system and play a crucial role in understanding the quark gluon plasma and its evolution. We explore the angular power spectrum of particle multiplicities in such heavy ion collisions to extract fluctuations in particle multiplicities on the surface a sphere. Results are presented for Pb-Pb data at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=2.76\mathrm{TeV}$, extracted from the ALICE open data portal. We find that odd modes of the power spectrum display a power-law behavior with corresponding index $\beta$, which is found to be close to unity. We also demonstrate that the angular power spectrum allows us to extract accurately the flow coefficients of noncentral collisions.

The suppression factor for single inclusive jets in $\text{Pb}+\text{Pb}$ collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has a weak dependence on the transverse momentum $p_T$ and remains almost the same at two colliding energies, $\sqrt{s}=2.76$ and 5.02 TeV, though the central rapidity density of bulk hadrons increases by about 20%. This phenomenon is investigated within the linear Boltzmann transport (LBT) model, which includes elastic and inelastic processes based on perturbative QCD for both jet shower and recoil medium partons as they propagate through a quark-gluon plasma (QGP). With the dynamic evolution of the QGP given by the $3+1\mathrm{D}$ CLVisc hydrodynamic model with event-by-event fully fluctuating initial conditions, single inclusive jet suppression in $\text{Pb}+\text{Pb}$ collisions from LBT agrees well with experimental data. The weak $\sqrt{s}$ and $p_T$ dependence of the jet suppression factor at LHC are found to result directly from the $\sqrt{s}$ dependence of the initial jet $p_T$ spectra and slow $p_T$ dependence of the jet energy loss. Contributions from jet-induced medium response, influence of radial expansion, both of which depend on jet-cone size, and jet flavor composition all conjoin to give a slow $p_T$ dependence of jet energy loss and the single jet suppression factor $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$, their dependence on $\sqrt{s}$, and jet-cone size. Single inclusive jet suppression at $\sqrt{s}=200\mathrm{GeV}$ is also predicted that actually decreases slightly with $p_T$ in the $p_T<50\mathrm{GeV}/c$ range because of the steeper initial jet spectra though the $p_T$ dependence of the jet energy loss is weaker than that at LHC.

Presented here are calculations of probabilities of the $K$-, $L$-, and $M$-shell ionization during $\alpha$ decay of superheavy isotopes ${}_{117}{}^{293}\mathrm{Ts}$, ${}_{115}{}^{289}\mathrm{Mc}$, and ${}_{113}{}^{285}\mathrm{Nh}$ involved in the tennessine decay chain as well as ${}_{118}{}^{294}\mathrm{Og}$, ${}_{116}{}^{290}\mathrm{Lv}$, and ${}_{114}{}^{286}\mathrm{Fl}$ involved in the new oganesson decay chain. The ionization probabilities are of importance for handling data obtained by methods of the combined $\alpha$, $\gamma$, and conversion-electron spectroscopy used in the superheavy element synthesis analysis. Relativistic calculations are based on the quantum mechanical model. Electron wave functions are determined by the Dirac-Fock method. The $\alpha$-particle tunneling through the atomic Coulomb barrier is taken into account. Peculiarities of the $K$-, $L$-, and $M$-shell ionization are considered. Results demonstrate that the effect of tunneling through the Coulomb barrier for the $L$ and $M$ shells is of no significance as distinct from the $K$ shell, where the inclusion of the tunneling leads to a considerable decrease of the ionization probability. The probability of ionization from higher shells is larger than that from inner shells. However, the change from the $K$ shell to $L$ shell is much more significant than the change from the $L$ shell to $M$ shell. It has been found that only monopole and dipole terms of the radiative field $L=0,1$ make a contribution to the $K$- and $L_1$-shell ionization probabilities while contributions of all multipoles $L\le 4$ may be important for the $L_2$, $L_3$, and particularly for $M_1-M_5$ subshells.

We present a comprehensive study on the low-lying states of neutron-rich Er, Yb, Hf, and W isotopes across the $N=126$ shell with a multireference covariant density functional theory. Beyond-mean-field effects from shape mixing and symmetry restoration on the observables that are relevant for understanding quadrupole collectivity and underlying shell structure are investigated. The general features of low-lying states in closed-shell nuclei are retained in these four isotopes around $N=126$, even though the shell gap is overall quenched by about 30% with the beyond-mean-field effects. These effects are consistent with the previous generator-coordinate calculations based on Gogny forces, but much smaller than that predicted by the collective Hamiltonian calculation. It implies that the beyond-mean-field effects on the $r$-process abundances before the third peak at $A\approx 195$ might be more moderate than that reported by Arcones and Bertsch [Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 151101 (2012)].

Momentum correlation functions at small relative momenta are calculated for light particles ($n,p,d,t$) emitted from ${}^{197}\mathrm{Au}+{}^{197}\mathrm{Au}$ collisions at different impact parameters and beam energies within the framework of the isospin-dependent quantum molecular dynamics model complemented by the analytical method of Lednický and Lyuboshitz. We first make sure our model is able to reproduce the FOPI detector data of proton-proton momentum correlation in a wide energy range from $0.4A$ to $1.5A$ GeV. Then we explore more physics insights through the emission times and momentum correlations among different light particles. The specific emphasis is on the effects of total pair momentum among different light particles, impact parameters, and in-medium nucleon-nucleon cross sections. Both two-deuteron and two-triton correlation functions are anticorrelated due to the final state interaction, and they are affected by the in-medium nucleon-nucleon cross section for higher total momentum of the particle pairs, but not for lower momentum. In addition, impact parameter and in-medium nucleon-nucleon cross section dependences of the emission source radii are extracted by fitting the momentum correlation functions. The results indicate that momentum correlation function gating with total pair momentum is stronger for smaller in-medium nucleon-nucleon cross section factor ($\eta$) or impact parameter ($b$). Nonidentical particle correlations ($np, pd, pt$, and $dt$) are also investigated by velocity-gated correlation functions, which can give information on the particles' emission sequence, and the result indicates that heavier ones (deuteron and triton) are, on average, emitted earlier than protons, in the small relative momentum region.

Several transport models have been employed in recent years to analyze heavy-flavor meson spectra in high-energy heavy-ion collisions. Heavy-quark transport coefficients extracted from these models with their default parameters vary, however, by up to a factor of 5 at high momenta. To investigate the origin of this large theoretical uncertainty, a systematic comparison of heavy-quark transport coefficients is carried out between various transport models. Within a common scheme devised for the nuclear modification factor of charm quarks in a brick medium of a quark-gluon plasma, the systematic uncertainty of the extracted drag coefficient among these models is shown to be reduced to a factor of 2, which can be viewed as the smallest intrinsic systematical error band achievable at present time. This indicates the importance of a realistic hydrodynamic evolution constrained by bulk hadron spectra and of heavy-quark hadronization for understanding the final heavy-flavor hadron spectra and extracting heavy-quark drag coefficient. The transverse transport coefficient is less constrained due to the influence of the underlying mechanism for heavy-quark medium interaction. Additional constraints on transport models such as energy loss fluctuation and transverse-momentum broadening can further reduce theoretical uncertainties in the extracted transport coefficients.

Experimental measurements in relativistic collisions of small systems from $p+p$ to $p/d/{}^3\mathrm{He}+\mathrm{A}$ at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) and the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) reveal particle emission patterns that are strikingly similar to those observed in $A+A$ collisions of large nuclei. One explanation of these patterns is the formation of small droplets of quark-gluon plasma (QGP) followed by hydrodynamic evolution. A geometry engineering program was proposed to further investigate these emission patterns, and the experimental data from that program in $p+\mathrm{Au}, d+\mathrm{Au}, {}^3\mathrm{He}+\mathrm{Au}$ collisions for elliptic and triangular anisotropy coefficients $v_2$ and $v_3$ follow the pattern predicted by hydrodynamic calculations [C. Aidala et al. (PHENIX Collaboration), Nat. Phys. 15, 214 (2019)]. One alternative approach, referred to as initial-state correlations, suggests that for small systems the patterns observed in the final-state hadrons are encoded at the earliest moments of the collision and therefore require no final-state parton scattering or hydrodynamic evolution. Recently, new calculations using only initial-state correlations, in the dilute-dense approximation of gluon saturation physics, reported striking agreement with the $v_2$ patterns observed in $p/d/{}^3\mathrm{He}+\mathrm{Au}$ data at RHIC [M. Mace, V. V. Skokov, P. Tribedy, and R. Venugopalan, Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 052301 (2018)]. The results reported by Mace, Skokov, Tribedy and Venugopalan (MSTV) are counterintuitive and thus we aim here to reproduce some of the basic features of these calculations. In this first investigation, we provide a description of our publicly available model, ip-jazma, and investigate its implications for saturation scales, multiplicity distributions, and eccentricities, reserving for later work the analysis of momentum spectra and azimuthal anisotropies. We find that our implementation of the saturation physics model reproduces the results of the MSTV calculation of the multiplicity distribution in $d+\mathrm{Au}$ collisions at RHIC. However, additional aspects of studies, together with existing data, call into question some of the essential elements reported by MSTV. Resolution of these issues will require further developments of ip-jazma, in order to determine if it can replicate the qualitative agreement with the $v_2$ reported by MSTV. Both the work reported here and future studies will establish which features in the experimental data are uniquely attributable to the color glass condensate description.

The heavy quark propagation behavior inside the quark-gluon plasma (QGP), is usually described in terms of the Boltzmann dynamics, which can be reduced to the Langevin approach by assuming a small momentum transfer for the scattering processes between heavy quarks and the QGP constituents. In this work, the temperature and energy dependence of the transport coefficients are calculated in the framework of both Boltzmann and Langevin dynamics, by considering only the elastic scattering processes to have a better comparison and understanding of these two models. The extracted transport coefficients are found to be larger in the Boltzmann approach as compared with the Langevin, in particular in the high-temperature and high-energy region. Within each of the two theoretical frameworks, we simulate the charm quark production and the subsequent evolution processes in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We find that the energy loss due to elastic scattering is larger from the Boltzmann dynamics, resulting in a smaller $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ at high $p_{\mathrm{T}}$ ($p_{\mathrm{T}}\gtrsim 10\mathrm{GeV}$), for both the charm quark and heavy-flavor mesons. The Boltzmann model produces systematically larger $v_2$, in particular at moderate $p_{\mathrm{T}}$, meanwhile, it shows a stronger broadening behavior for the relative azimuthal angle between initially back-to-back generated $c\overline{c}$ pairs in the similar region. They are mainly induced by the stronger interactions between heavy quarks and the QGP partons in Boltzmann, which are able to transfer more $v_2$ from the medium to the heavy quarks, as well as to pull more $c\overline{c}$ pairs from high momentum to low momentum. By comparing the model calculations with available experimental measurements for D mesons, a visible deviation can be observed for both the Boltzmann and Langevin approaches. The missing inelastic contributions allow reducing the discrepancy with data, and additionally, the relevant Langevin approach is more favored by the $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ data while the Boltzmann approach is more favored favor by the $v_2$ data. A simultaneous description of both observables appears challenging for both models.

Repulsive hadronic interactions play a relevant role in QCD dynamics, attractive ones being represented by resonance formation. In this study we propose different schemes in order to parameterize repulsive interactions, thus being able to extract effective sizes of hadrons from fits to lattice QCD simulations. We find that allowing a difference between the strange and light sectors, strange particles are systematically smaller than light ones with equal mass. The very simple implementation of repulsive interactions would in principle allow us to extract precise information about all hadronic species once corresponding lattice observables, sensitive to the species of interest, are provided. With the parametrization which best reproduces lattice data there is also a good description of experimental yields measured by the ALICE and STAR experiments.