Probing Baryon Transport Dynamics and Strangeness Production with Hyperon-kaon Correlations

In nuclear collisions at RHIC energies, the anti-hyperon to hyperon ratios are below unity, particularly at BES II energies. The net hyperons indicate that the baryon quantum numbers from the colliding beams have been transported to hyperons in nuclear collisions. Recent interest has focused on the dynamics of baryon number transport, with a hypothesis suggesting that multi-gluon configurations, like gluon junctions, may carry baryon numbers in protons and neutrons. These interactions of gluon junctions may provide an effective mechanism for baryon number transport to hyperons including Ω hyperons over a large rapidity gap. Mid-rapidity hyperon production and hyperon-K correlations could probe the baryon number transport dynamics and strangeness production mechanism. We will present STAR measurements of the hyperon-K correlations from d+Au collisions at √(S_NN )=200 GeV. Comparisons with AMPT and UrQMD calculations and implications on the baryon number transport dynamics will also be discussed.