Based on a multiphase transport model, we have studied the elliptic flow $v_2$ of ϕ mesons from the reconstructed $K^{+}{K}^{-}$ decay channel at the top Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider energy at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The dependences of $v_2$ on transverse momentum $p_T$ and collision centrality are presented and the rescattering effect of ϕ mesons in the hadronic phase is also investigated. The results show that experimental measurement of $v_2$ for ϕ mesons can retain the early collision information before the ϕ decays and that the ϕ $v_2$ value obeys the constituent quark number scaling that has been observed for other mesons and baryons. Our study indicates that the ϕ $v_2$ mostly reflects partonic-level collectivity developed during the early stage of the nucleus-nucleus collision and the strange and light up/down quarks have developed similar angular anistropy properties at the hadronization.

• Received 8 March 2006

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.74.064902