Scaled factorial moments and split-bin correlation functions. A thermodynamic model comparison

Abstract We compare the scaled factorial moments to the recently proposed split-bin correlation functions, using the thermodynamic model for heavy ion collisions that was recently demonstrated to exhibit power-law growth of the scaled factorial moments as a function of bin size. We find that the split-bin correlation functions are superior for experimental use, as they are intensitive to fictitious correlations due to limited resolving power. In addition, after correction for non-flat single-particle distributions, the split-bin correlation functions provide an unambiguous signal for correlations. As a result, they may provide more powerful evidence for new phenomena like fractal structure …