2.15 Visualization of a heavy quark propagating through a thermal plasma. The fundamental quark is represented by a string hang- ing from a D 7 brane (in this case at r = ∞ ) down through the horizon onto the stack of coincident D 3 branes. Its motion causes a metric disturbance on the Mikowski boundary dual to a wake in the SYM plasma and a loss of momentum down the length of the string. Figure adapted from [340]. . . . . . . . . 71 2.16 The away side correlation functions of particles produced by Cooper-Frye hadronization associated with a high- p$_{T}$ jet propa- gating through a thermalized bulk plasma. The hydrodynamic source on the left comes from pQCD calculations [355]; the right from AdS/CFT [340]. Figure adapted from [354]. . . . . . . . 73 3.1 Star h ± data for 0-5%, 10-20%, 20-30%, 30-40%, and 40-60%, Phenix h ± data for 0-20%, 20-40%, and 40-60%, and Phenix π 0 data for 10-20%, 20-30%, . . . , 50-60% centralities. MPC results for increasing χ that should go between the 20-30% and 30-40% Phenix π 0 results. GREL results for increasing κ that misses the 40-50% Phenix π 0 data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 3.2 Addition of thermal absorption (dashed blue curve) or momen- tum punch (solid red curve) to GREL; models’ free parameters fit to Phenix 20-30% centrality π 0 R$_{AA}$ ( φ ) . . . . . . . . . . 86 xi