Energy loss, hadronization, and hadronic interactions of heavy flavors in relativistic heavy-ion collisions

We construct a theoretical framework to describe the evolution of heavy flavors produced in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. The in-medium energy loss of heavy quarks is described using our modified Langevin equation that incorporates both quasielastic scatterings and the medium-induced gluon radiation. The space-time profiles of the fireball are described by a (2+1)-dimensional hydrodynamics simulation. A hybrid model of fragmentation and coalescence is utilized for heavy quark hadronization, after which the produced heavy mesons together with the soft hadrons produced from the bulk quark-gluon plasma (QGP) are fed into the hadron cascade ultrarelativistic quantum molecular dynamics (UrQMD) model to simulate the subsequent hadronic interactions. We find that the medium-induced gluon radiation contributes significantly to heavy quark energy loss at high pT; heavy-light quark coalescence enhances heavy meson production at intermediate pT; and scatterings inside the hadron gas further suppress the D meson RAA at large pT and enhance its v₂. Our calculations provide good descriptions of heavy meson suppression and elliptic flow observed at both the Large Hadron Collider and the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider.