The medium modification of the charge-weighted Energy-Energy Correlators in Pb+Pb collisions at TeV*

Abstract We report a systematic study and predictions of medium-induced modifications in charge-dependent jet substructure using the charge-weighted Energy-Energy Correlators (EEC) in 0−10% central Pb+Pb collisions at . Charged-hadron jets, as well as flavor-separated quark- and gluon-initiated jets with momenta of 40−60 GeV and R = 0.4, are analyzed. The ratio of the charge-weighted distribution to the inclusive EEC, which reflects the magnitude of charge correlations, is uniformly negative, demonstrating the dominance of opposite-charge pairs due to charge conservation. A clear flavor dependence is observed: gluon-initiated jets exhibit weaker opposite-charge correlations in the transition and small- R L regions than quark-initiated jets, but stronger opposite-charge correlations at larger R L . In Pb+Pb collisions, the A + A -to- p + p ratio for charge correlations exhibits a universal, flavor-independent pattern: jet quenching enhances opposite-charge correlations at small angles while suppressing them at large angles, leading to a steeper R L dependence of charge correlations in A + A and indicating more rapid decorrelation as R L increases. A distinctive V-shaped modification, together with a plateau-like enhancement, appears in the transition and small- R L regions, independent of jet flavor. By factorizing the EEC into the charged-hadron–pair multiplicity and the average energy-weighting distribution, we identify an enhanced but smeared energy weighting of opposite-charge pairs at small R L as the origin of this modification. These observations indicate that medium-induced broadening of parton-level splittings in the hot, dense medium dissociates the charged di-hadron pairs (such as ) present in p + p collisions. The plateau-like enhancement of charge correlations is also found to be unrelated to selection-bias effects.