Speaker
Description
The location of the conjectured QCD critical point remains one of the key open questions in the phase diagram of strongly interacting matter. While lattice QCD provides strict constraints at vanishing baryon density, the sign problem prevents direct simulations at finite chemical potential. Nevertheless, a growing body of theoretical work—spanning functional methods as well as holographic models rooted in the gauge/gravity correspondence—predicts the critical point to lie within a similar region of the $(T, \mu_B)$ plane. These theoretical predictions are increasingly consistent with indications from finite-size scaling analyses of experimental data. In this talk, we review the current landscape of theoretical approaches to the QCD critical point, emphasizing their convergence and implications for upcoming experimental searches.
