We present detailed calculations about the expected shape of two-pion Bose-Einstein [or Hanbury-Brown–Twiss (HBT)] correlations in high energy heavy ion collisions that include a realistic treatment of final state Coulomb interaction as well as strong interactions (dominated by $s$-wave scattering). We assume Lévy type source functions, a generalization that goes beyond the Gaussian approximation. Various recent experimental results found the use of such source types necessary to properly describe the shape of the measured correlation functions. We find that strong interaction effects for like-sign pions are small, but their consideration may become important in future precision measurements, especially if one considers source parameters beyond the Gaussian HBT radii. Precise experimental determination of these source parameters (such as Lévy stability exponent, correlation strength, etc.) may then benefit from the inclusion of the treatment of strong interaction not just for heavier particles (e.g., protons, $\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{s}$) but also in case of two-pion measurements.

Exploring the shape of the pair-source function for particles such as pions or kaons has been an important goal of heavy-ion physics, and substantial effort has been made in order to understand the underlying physics behind the experimental observations of non-Gaussian behavior. In experiments, since no direct measurement of the source function is possible, quantum-statistical momentum correlations are utilized to gain information about the space-time geometry of the particle emitting source. Event generators, such as EPOS, however, provide direct access to the freeze-out coordinates of final state particles, and thus the source function can be constructed and investigated. The EPOS model is a sophisticated hybrid model where the initial stage evolution of the system is governed by Parton-Based Gribov–Regge theory, and subsequently a hydrodynamic evolution is utilized, followed by hadronization and hadron dynamics. EPOS has already proven to be successful in describing several different experimental observations for systems characterized by baryon chemical potential close to zero, but so far the source shape has not been explored in detail. In this paper we discuss an event-by-event analysis of the two-particle source function in $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 200 GeV Au+Au collisions generated by the EPOS model. We find that when utilizing all stages of the model, Lévy-shaped distributions (unlike Gaussian distributions) provide a good description of the source shape in the individual events. Hence it is clear that it is not the event averaging that creates the non-Gaussian features in the pair distributions. Based on this observation, we determine Lévy-parameters of the source as a function of event centrality and particle momentum.

Femtoscopy is a unique tool to investigate the space-time geometry of the matter created in ultra-relativistic collisions. If the probability density distribution of hadron emission is parametrized, then the dependence of its parameters on particle momentum, collision energy, and collision geometry can be given. In recent years, several measurements came to light that indicated the adequacy of assuming a Lévy-stable shape for the mentioned distribution. In parallel, several new phenomenological developments appeared, aiding the interpretation of the experimental results or providing tools for the measurements. In this paper, we discuss important aspects of femtoscopy with Lévy sources in light of some of these advances, including phenomenological and experimental ones.

Measurements of Bose–Einstein correlations played a crucial role in the discovery and the subsequent detailed exploration of the Quark-Gluon-Plasma (QGP) created in high-energy collisions of heavy nuclei. Such measurements gave rise to femtoscopy, a flourishing sub-field of high-energy physics, and there are important new directions to explore and discoveries to be made in the near future. One of these important current topics is the precise investigation of the shape of the correlation functions utilizing Lévy-stable sources. In this paper, we utilize Lebesgue’s dominated convergence theorem and Fubini’s theorem to present a novel method of calculating the shape of the two-particle correlation functions, including the Coulomb final-state interaction. This method relies on an exact calculation of a large part of the necessary integrals of the Coulomb wave function and can be utilized to calculate the correlation function for any source function with an easily accessible Fourier transform. In this way, it is eminently applicable to Lévy-stable source functions. In this particular case, we find that the new method is more robust and allows the investigation of a wider parameter range than the previously utilized techniques. We present an easily applicable software package that is ready to use in experimental studies.

In the study of femtoscopic correlations in high-energy physics, besides Bose–Einstein correlations, one has to take final-state interactions into account. Amongst them, Coulomb interactions play a prominent role in the case of charged particles. Recent measurements have shown that in heavy-ion collisions, Bose–Einstein correlations can be best described by Lévy-type sources instead of the more common Gaussian assumption. Furthermore, three-dimensional measurements have indicated that, depending on the choice of frame, a deviation from spherical symmetry observed under the assumption of Gaussian source functions persists in the case of Lévy-type sources. To clarify such three-dimensional Lévy-type correlation measurements, it is thus important to study the effect of Coulomb interactions in the case of non-spherical Lévy sources. We calculated the Coulomb correction factor numerically in the case of such a source function for assorted kinematic domains and parameter values using the Metropolis–Hastings algorithm and compared our results with previous methods to treat Coulomb interactions in the presence of Lévy sources.