Chemical equilibration of an expanding quark-gluon plasma

The chemical equilibration of the parton distribution in collisions of two heavy nuclei at the CERN large Hadron Collider is investigated. Initial conditions are obtained from a self-screened parton cascade calculation. The onset of transverse expansion of the system is found to impede the chemical equilibration. The system initially approaches chemical equilibrium, but then is driven away from it, when the transverse velocity becomes large.