In the aftermath of heavy-ion collisions, the formation of the quark-gluon plasma is preceded by a short-lived, highly energetic, out-of-equilibrium state. This pre-equilibrium medium evolves through multiple stages on its way toward hydrodynamization, offering new opportunities for experimental exploration, especially with the upcoming high-luminosity heavy-ion program and medium-sized collision systems at the LHC. In this talk, I will discuss the potential of hard QCD probes, such as jets and heavy quarks, to provide a tomographic picture of the evolving medium and to infer unique non-equilibrium properties of many-body QCD. Produced at the earliest times, these probes strongly interact with the medium throughout its evolution and may be sensitive to distinct non-equilibrium features, including enhanced momentum broadening and momentum-space anisotropies, with direct consequences for jet quenching and heavy-quark diffusion.
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