This book focuses on new experimental and theoretical advances concerning the role of strange and heavy-flavour quarks in high-energy heavy-ion collisions and in astrophysical phenomena. The topics covered include • Strangeness and heavy-quark production in nuclear collisions and hadronic interactions, • Hadron resonances in the strongly-coupled partonic and hadronic medium, • Bulk matter phenomena associated with strange and heavy quarks, • QCD phase structure, • Collectivity in small systems, • Strangeness in astrophysics,• Open questions and new developments.

This book highlights the discussions by renown researchers on questions emerged during transition from the relativistic heavy-ion collider (RHIC) to the future electron ion collider (EIC). Over the past two decades, the RHIC has provided a vast amount of data over a wide range of the center of mass energies. What are the scientific priorities, after RHIC is shut down and turned to the future EIC? What should be the future focuses of the high-energy nuclear collisions? What are thermodynamic properties of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) at large baryon density? Where is the phase boundary between quark-gluon-plasma and hadronic matter at high baryon density? How does one make connections from thermodynamics learned in high-energy nuclear collisions to astrophysical topics, to name few, the inner structure of compact stars, and perhaps more interestingly, the dynamical processes of the merging of neutron stars? While most particle physicists are interested in Dark Matter, we should focus on the issues of Visible Matter! Multiple heavy-ion accelerator complexes are under construction: NICA at JINR (4 ~ 11 GeV), FAIR at GSI (2 ~ 4.9 GeV SIS100), HIAF at IMP (2 ~ 4 GeV). In addition, the heavy-ion collision has been actively discussed at the J-PARC. The book is a collective work of top researchers from the field where some of the above-mentioned basic questions will be addressed. We believe that answering those questions will certainly advance our understanding of the phase transition in early universe as well as its evolution that leads to today's world of nature.

This comprehensive volume summarizes and structures the multitude of results obtained at the LHC in its first running period and draws the grand picture of today’s physics at a hadron collider. Topics covered are Standard Model measurements, Higgs and top-quark physics, flavour physics, heavy-ion physics, and searches for supersymmetry and other extensions of the Standard Model. Emphasis is placed on overview and presentation of the lessons learned. Chapters on detectors and the LHC machine and a thorough outlook into the future complement the book. The individual chapters are written by teams of expert authors working at the forefront of LHC research.

Annotation. Text reviews the major topics in Quark-Gluon Plasma, including: the QCD phase diagram, the transition temperature, equation of state, heavy quark free energies, and thermal modifications of hadron properties. Includes index, references, and appendix. For researchers and practitioners.

This book will be of great interest to advanced students and researchers in the area of high energy theoretical physics. Being the most complete and updated review volume on Perturbative QCD, it serves as an extremely useful textbook or reference book. Some of the reviews in this volume are the best that have been written on the subject anywhere.

An accessible introduction to nuclear and particle physics with equal coverage of both topics, this text covers all the standard topics in particle and nuclear physics thoroughly and provides a few extras, including chapters on experimental methods; applications of nuclear physics including fission, fusion and biomedical applications; and unsolved problems for the future. It includes basic concepts and theory combined with current and future applications. An excellent resource for physics and astronomy undergraduates in higher-level courses, this text also serves well as a general reference for graduate studies.