Light Hadron Physics

Dear Colleagues,

Light hadron physics explores strong interactions in the nonperturbative regime of quantum chromodynamics (QCD), where the emergence of hadron masses, confinement and complex resonance structures remain central challenges. In recent years, the BESIII experiment at BEPCII has provided a wealth of high-statistics data in the tau-charm energy region, significantly advancing the study of light mesons, baryons and hadronic transitions. These measurements have opened new opportunities to investigate the spectroscopy and dynamics of conventional and exotic hadrons, test fundamental symmetries and constrain effective descriptions of low-energy QCD.

This overview summarizes recent experimental and theoretical progress in light hadron physics with emphasis on BESIII results. On the experimental side, BESIII has produced important measurements of scalar, pseudoscalar, vector and axial-vector mesons through charmonium decays, radiative processes and direct electron–positron annihilation. High-precision studies of states such as scalar and tensor mesons and various exotic structures have shed light on line-shape distortions and threshold effects. BESIII has also played a key role in searches for glueball candidates, strangeonium states and isospin-violating processes, while providing valuable information on light baryon spectroscopy and hyperon production.

On the theoretical side, the chiral perturbation theory provides a model-independent framework for low-energy hadronic interactions. Dispersive methods including Roy equations and Khuri--Treiman techniques enable rigorous partial-wave analyses of light hadron scattering, while lattice QCD has reached sub-percent precision. Phenomenological approaches, such as vector meson dominance and effective Lagrangians with resonances, complement these first-principles methods. Together, these tools yield precise descriptions of scalar mesons, light-hadron spectroscopy, hadronic contributions to the muon g−2, exotic states and electromagnetic form factors, thereby disentangling the nature of nonperturbative strong interactions.

Prof. Dr. Shuangshi Fang
Prof. Dr. Lingyun Dai
Prof. Dr. Xianwei Kang
Guest Editors

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