Modern Approaches to Non-Perturbative QCD and other Confining Gauge Theories
A special issue of Universe (ISSN 2218-1997). This special issue belongs to the section "Foundations of Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Gravity".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 April 2021) | Viewed by 25799
Special Issue Editor
Interests: theoretical high-energy physics and quantum field theory; non-perturbative approaches to quantum chromodynamics: confining strings and their phenomenological applications; models of confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking; thermodynamics and transport properties of strongly interacting quark–gluon plasma; topological and finite-temperature properties of field-theoretical models admitting an analytic description of confinement; effects of confinement in one-loop amplitudes
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Since the mid 70s, confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking have been recognized as the main non-perturbative phenomena in quantum chromodynamics (QCD). Yet, their full quantitative description is still lacking. The primary intention of this Special Issue is to provide a collection of reviews on modern approaches to these two phenomena.
In the case of confinement, such approaches include the various microscopic models of the Yang–Mills vacuum, specifically calorons and center vortices, as well as their phenomenological application to the SU(2) Yang–Mills thermodynamics and to the determination of the static potential in the SU(2) QCD with light quarks, respectively. Other microscopic models of confinement, such as those based on the condensation of magnetic monopoles in theories with the compact Abelian gauge group, admit an analytic derivation of the corresponding confining-string action. One of the reviews in this Special Issue is planned to be devoted to the recent studies of confining strings and the application of the related techniques to the analysis of the novel superinsulating state, which emerges in such condensed-matter systems as the Josephson junction arrays.
Furthermore, there exist indications of an interrelation between confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking, which stem, e.g., from the relations between the chiral and the gluon condensates, known from the QCD sum rules and the low-energy QCD theorems. This Special Issue will present a review of an approach to the study of this interrelation by means of lattice simulations of low-lying Dirac eigenmodes. While these modes are delocalised at low temperature, they become localised at high temperature, with the lattice simulations suggesting that the localisation occurs precisely at the deconfinement critical temperature.
A complementary review, devoted to confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking at finite baryon density, will also be presented. The corresponding studies are motivated by the fact that current and planned experiments have the capability to explore the phase diagram of strong interactions. Finite baryon density can affect the possible interplay between confinement and chiral-symmetry breaking, as seen, e.g., in the recently discovered inhomogeneous phases, which may have various confining and topological properties.
Last but not least, one of the reviews presented in this Special Issue will provide an overview of the modern analytic and lattice approaches to confinement.
Dr. Dmitry AntonovGuest Editor
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Keywords
- modern analytic and lattice approaches to the problem of quark confinement
- semiclassical models of the Yang–Mills vacuum (calorons, monopoles, center vortices) and their phenomenological applications (e.g., to the thermodynamics of gluon plasma)
- confining strings and flux tubes in gauge theories and condensed-matter systems
- spontaneous breaking of chiral symmetry in QCD and the low-energy spectrum of the QCD Dirac operator
- the QCD phase diagram and the effects of finite baryon density
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