Orateur
Description
give an overview of recent progress in implementing quark flavors and the strange quark mass in the holographic V-QCD model. The model, including its flavor dependence, is pinned down by a detailed comparison with (N_f=2+1) flavor lattice QCD results for the equation of state and quark number susceptibilities at small chemical potentials. Taking into account the flavor dependence and the strange quark mass significantly affects the results at finite density. I discuss implications for neutron star physics and the critical point in the QCD phase diagram as a function of temperature and baryon chemical potential. In beta equilibrium, the critical point is found at much smaller density than in earlier constructions. If one instead imposes constraints mimicking conditions relevant for heavy-ion collisions, the critical point disappears entirely.