Silver Blaze Puzzle in 1/Nc Expansions of Cold and Dense QCD Matter

Abstract

We consider quantum chromodynamics (QCD) with Nc colors and Nf quark flavors at finite quark chemical potential mu_q or isospin chemical potential mu_I. We specifically address the nature of the ``Silver Blaze'' behavior in the framework of 1/Nc expansion. Starting with the QCD partition function, we implement Veneziano's Nf/Nc expansion to identify the density onset. We find the baryon mass M_B and the pion mass m_pi appearing from different order of Veneziano's expansion. We argue that the confining properties are responsible for the Silver Blaze in the region of m_pi/2 < mu_q < M_B/Nc. We point out, however, that Veneziano's expansion brings about a puzzling subtlety along the same line as the baryon problem in finite-density quenched simulations. We emphasize that the large-Nc limit can allow for the physical ordering of M_B and m_pi thanks to the similarity to the quenched approximation, while the unphysical ghost quarks contaminate the baryon sector if Nc is finite. We also discuss the ``orientifold'' large-Nc limit that does not quench quark loops.