Cavitation and penetration in central collisions with light ions

The dynamical evolution of central collisions induced by GeV light-ion projectiles is examined with two different Boltzmann-Uehling-Uhlenbeck (BUU) calculations. For projectile energies above 1 GeV incident on heavy target nuclei, a region of depleted density develops in the core of the nucleus at times of the order of 30 fm/c, producing hot residues with significantly depleted density at longer times. The simulations predict penetration of the target by the projectile momentum front at incident energies near 4--6 GeV, leading to a saturation of deposition energy. These results are examined in the context of marked changes in reaction observables reported for light-ion-induced collisions. {} 1996 The American Physical Society.