ALICE : the LHC experiment devoted to heavy ions: Conference MT17

The object of High Energy Heavy Ion Physics is the study of strongly interacting matter at extreme energy densities and large volumes. QCD predicts that, under such conditions (high densities and large volume), hadronic matter turns into a plasma of deconfined quarks and gluons [Quark Gluon Plasma: (QGP)]. Physicists believe that matter in the Universe existed in this state up to the time when hadronization occurred i.e.10 ms after the Big Bang. Today QGP might exist in the core of neutron stars. The study of the phase diagram of matter is a new approach to investigate QCD at its natural scale, L QCD, and to address the fundamental question of confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking. The ALICE Collaboration will study QGP by observing lead nuclei colliding in the LHC at energies 30 times larger than presently available at RHIC, as well as proton-proton collisions.