Measurement of elliptic flow of J/ψ in sNN=200 GeV Au+Au collisions at forward rapidity

We report the first measurement of the azimuthal anisotropy of 𝐽/𝜓 at forward rapidity (1.2<|𝜂|<2.2) in Au+Au collisions at √𝑠𝑁⁢𝑁=200 GeV at the BNL Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. The data were collected by the PHENIX experiment in 2014 and 2016 with integrated luminosity of 14.5 nb−1. The second Fourier coefficient (𝑣2) of the azimuthal distribution of 𝐽/𝜓 is determined as a function of the transverse momentum (𝑝𝑇) using the event-plane method. The measurements were performed for several selections of collision centrality: 0%–50%, 10%–60%, and 10%–40%. We find that in all cases the values of 𝑣2⁡(𝑝𝑇), which quantify the elliptic flow of 𝐽/𝜓, are consistent with zero. Within uncertainties, the results are consistent with measurements at midrapidity, indicating no significant elliptic flow of the 𝐽/𝜓 within the quark-gluon-plasma medium at collision energies of √𝑠𝑁⁢𝑁=200 GeV.