In this paper, we have discussed the transverse momentum dependence of elliptic flow measured in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. The transverse momentum dependence of the number of constituent quarks ($n_{ q}$) scaled $v_{ 2}$ is obtained for all the measured identified hadrons. The $n_{ q}$ scaled $\phi$ $v_{ 2}$ is found to be similar to $n_{ q}$ scaled $\Omega$ $v_{ 2}$. This indicates that both $\phi$ and $\Omega$ are produced through quark recombination at RHIC energies. We also find $n_{ q}$ scaled proton $v_{ 2}$ ($v_{ 2}$ of light quarks) is higher than $n_{ q}$ scaled $\phi$ and $\Omega$ $v_{ 2}$ ($v_{ 2}$ of strange quarks) at $p_{ T}/n_{ q}$ $<$ 1.0 GeV/c. This can be explained by considering quark $v_{ 2}$ is proportional to its transverse kinetic energy considering mass of deconfined light and strange quarks equal to $\sim $4 MeV and $\sim$ 140 MeV, respectively.
Categories: nucl-ex hep-ex hep-ph nucl-th