Transverse energy measurement in Au+Au collisions by the STAR experiment

Transverse energy (E _T ) has been measured with both of its components, namely hadronic (E _T ^had ) and electromagnetic (E _T ^em ) in a common phase space at mid-rapidity for 62.4 GeV Au+Au collisions by the STAR experiment. E _T production with centrality and ?{s_NN }\sqrt {s_{NN} } is studied with similar measurements from SPS to RHIC and is compared with a final state gluon saturation model (EKRT). The most striking feature is the observation of a nearly constant value of E _T /N _ch ∼ 0.8 GeV from AGS, SPS to RHIC. The initial energy density estimated by the boost-invariant Bjorken hydrodynamic model, is well above the critical density for a deconfined matter of quarks and gluons predicted by lattice QCD calculations.