Elliptic flow of $\phi$ mesons at intermediate $p_{T}$: Influence of mass versus quark number

We have studied elliptic flow (v(2)) of phi mesons in the framework of a multiphase transport (AMPT) model at CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) energy. In the realms of AMPT model we observe that phi mesons at intermediate transverse momentum (pT) deviate from the previously observed [at the BNL Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC)] particle type grouping of v(2) according to the number of quark content, i. e, baryons and mesons. Recent results from the ALICE Collaboration have shown that phi meson and proton v(2) has a similar trend, possibly indicating that particle type grouping might be due to the mass of the particles and not the quark content. A stronger radial boost at LHC compared to RHIC seems to offer a consistent explanation to such observation. However, recalling that phi mesons decouple from the hadronic medium before additional radial flow is built up in the hadronic phase, a similar pattern in phi meson and proton v(2) may not be due to radial flow alone. Our study reveals that models incorporating phi-meson production from K (K) over bar fusion in the hadronic rescattering phase also predict a comparable magnitude of phi meson and proton v(2) particularly in the intermediate region of pT. Whereas, v(2) of phi mesons created in the partonic phase is in agreement with quark-coalescence motivated baryon-meson grouping of hadron v(2). This observation seems to provide a plausible alternative interpretation for the apparent mass-like behavior of f-meson v(2). We have also observed a violation of hydrodynamical mass ordering between proton and phi meson v(2) further supporting that phi mesons are negligibly affected by the collective radial flow in the hadronic phase due to the small in-medium hadronic interaction cross sections.