We review the current state of research on electromagnetic probes in the context of heavy-ion collisions. The focus is on thermal photons and dileptons which provide unique insights into the properties of the created hot and dense matter. This review is intended to provide an introductory overview of the topic as well as a discussion of recent theoretical and experimental results. In particular, we discuss the role of vector-meson spectral functions in the calculation of photon and dilepton rates and present recent results obtained from different frameworks. Furthermore, we will highlight the special role of photons and dileptons to provide information on observables such as the temperature, the lifetime, the polarization and the electrical conductivity of the produced medium as well as their use to learn about chiral symmetry restoration and phase transitions.

我们回顾了重离子碰撞背景下电磁探测器的研究现状。重点是热光子和双轻子，它们提供了对所产生的热致密物质特性的独特见解。本综述旨在提供对该主题的介绍性概述以及对最近的理论和实验结果的讨论。特别是，我们讨论了矢量-介子谱函数在光子和双轻子率计算中的作用，并展示了从不同框架获得的最新结果。此外，我们将强调光子和双轻子的特殊作用，以提供有关可观测信息的信息，例如温度、寿命、