On the morning of April 7, 2026, the 10th IOPP Colloquium was held in the Institute of Particle Physics (IOPP), Central China Normal University. Professor Ionut Cristian Arsene from the University of Oslo, Norway, delivered a talk titled "Heavy Quarks Production in High Energy Nuclear Collisions: Past, Present and Future."

Professor Arsene's talk systematically reviewed the history of heavy quark research in relativistic nuclear collisions. He began by introducing the physical motivations for studying heavy quarks, noting that they serve as sensitive probes for exploring the macroscopic and microscopic properties of the Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP). He elaborated on experimental methods for measuring open heavy-flavor hadrons and quarkonia, focusing on the experimental results of nuclear modification factors (RAA ) and elliptic flow (v2 ) for heavy-flavor hadrons at RHIC and LHC energies. The presentation analyzed physical mechanisms such as heavy quark energy loss, thermalization, diffusion, and the "dead cone" effect. Furthermore, he outlined the scientific goals of the ALICE upgrade plans (FoCal and future ALICE3) for high-precision measurements of exotic quarkonia, bottomonia, and multi-charm baryons.

During the discussion session, Professor Arsene engaged in in-depth exchanges with Ph.D students on frontier topics, including the extraction of heavy quark transport coefficients, the impact of Cold Nuclear Matter (CNM) effects on charmonium yields, and the complementarity between future Electron-Ion Collider (EIC) and ALICE3 in nuclear imaging studies. He emphasized that heavy quark physics provides a unique perspective for understanding the dynamical evolution of the QGP, and that future detector upgrades will significantly expand our knowledge of the nuclear matter phase diagram.

The IOPP Colloquium is a series of academic activities organized by the Institute of Particle Physics, designed to provide educational and inspirational academic talks for all faculty and students, thereby fostering a vibrant research environment and collaborative atmosphere.

Professor Xin-Nian Wang, Director of C3NT and IOPP, presented Professor Ionut Cristian Arsene with the 10th IOPP Colloquium Commemorative plaque

Professor Ionut Cristian Arsene is currently a staff researcher at the Physics Department of the University of Oslo, Norway, a position he has held since 2017.He received his PhD from the University of Oslo in 2009, working on phenomenological relativistic hydrodynamical models and on data analysis from the BRAHMS experiment at RHIC.He continued with a postdoctoral fellowship at the Extreme Matter Institute (EMMI) at GSI from 2009 to 2013, where he first started working in the ALICE collaboration. He then returned to the University of Oslo as a postdoc from 2013 to 2017, before taking up his current researcher position. He is currently a member of the ALICE, NA61/SHINE and ePIC collaborations.Since joining the ALICE Collaboration, he has fulfilled several management roles as a member of the ALICE Physics Board, Editorial Board and Conference Committee. He also convened the ALICE physics working group for Dileptons and Quarkonia. At present, he is serving a three-year mandate as Deputy of the ALICE Collaboration Board Chair and is also coordinating the physics and software group for the ALICE Forward Calorimeter (FoCal) upgrade.

Group Photo of the 10th IOPP Colloquium

Correspondent: Xiangyu Shui
Proofreader: Zhongbao Yin