With a multiphase transport (AMPT) model we investigate the relation between the magnitude, fluctuations, and correlations of the initial state spatial anisotropy ${\varepsilon }_n$ and the final state anisotropic flow coefficients $v_n$ in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{{}_{\mathrm{NN}}}}=200$ GeV. It is found that the relative eccentricity fluctuations in AMPT account for the observed elliptic flow fluctuations, both are in agreement with the elliptic flow fluctuation measurements from the STAR collaboration. In addition, the studies based on two- and multiparticle correlations and event-by-event distributions of the anisotropies suggest that the elliptic-power function is a promising candidate of the underlying probability density function of the event-by-event distributions of ${\varepsilon }_n$ as well as $v_n$. Furthermore, the correlations between different order symmetry planes and harmonics in the initial coordinate space and final state momentum space are presented. Nonzero values of these correlations have been observed. The comparison between our calculations and data will, in the future, shed new insight into the nature of the fluctuations of the quark-gluon plasma produced in heavy ion collisions.

• Received 14 August 2015

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.93.034909