arXiv subjects

C. Villavicencio

Publications and source records attributed to C. Villavicencio.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2023

Magnetic and density effects on the nucleon axial coupling

Using appropriate QCD finite energy sum rules, we discuss the influence of an external magnetic field and baryonic density on the axial-vector coupling constant $g_{A}$. This scenario corresponds to a magnetar environment. We found that $g_{A}$ decreases both as function of the magnetic field strength and the baryonic density. It turns out that at the nuclear density $ρ_{0}$ the axial-vector coupling takes the value $g_{A}^{*} \approx 0.92$. Although $g_{A}$ decreases in general with the magnetic field intensity, $g_{A}^{*}$ does not change in a relevant way with the magnetic field.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Half-integer anomalous currents in 2D materials from a QFT viewpoint

Charge carriers in Dirac/Weyl semi-metals exhibit a relativistic-like behavior. In this work we propose a novel type of intrinsic half-integer Quantum Hall effect in 2D materials, thereby also offering a topological protection mechanism for the current. Its existence is rooted in the 2D parity anomaly, without any need for a perpendicular magnetic field. We conjecture that it may occur in disturbed honeycomb lattices where both spin degeneracy and time reversal symmetry are broken. These configurations harbor two distinct gap-opening mechanisms that, when occurring simultaneously, drive slightly different gaps in each valley, causing a net anomalous conductivity when the chemical potential is tuned to be between the distinct gaps. Some examples of promising material setups that fulfill the prerequisites of our proposal are also listed to motivate looking for the effect at the numerical and experimental level.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Magnetic catalysis of a finite size pion condensate

We study the Bose-Einstein condensation of a finite size pion gas subject to the influence of a magnetic field. We find the expressions for the critical chemical potential and temperature for the onset of condensation. We show that for values of the external magnetic flux larger than the elemental flux, the critical temperature is larger than the one obtained by considering only finite size effects. We use experimentally reported values of pion source sizes and multiplicities at LHC energies to show that if the magnetic flux, produced initially in peripheral heavy-ion collision, is at least partially preserved up to the hadronic phase, the combined finite size and magnetic field effects give rise to a critical temperature above the kinetic freeze-out temperature. We discuss the implications for the evolution of the pion system created in relativistic heavy-ion collisions.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Thermo-magnetic properties of the strong coupling in the local Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model

We study the thermo-magnetic properties of the strong coupling constant G and quark mass M entering the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model. For this purpose, we compute the quark condensate and compare it to lattice QCD (LQCD) results to extract the behavior of G and M as functions of the magnetic field strength and temperature. We find that at zero temperature, where the LQCD condensate is found to monotonically increase with the field strength, M also increases whereas G remains approximately constant. However, for temperatures above the chiral/deconfinement phase transitions, where the LQCD condensate is found to monotonically decrease with increasing field, M and G also decrease monotonically. For finite temperatures, below the transition temperature, we find that both G and M initially grow and then decrease with increasing field strength. To study possible consequences of the extracted temperature and magnetic field dependence of G and M, we compute the pressure and compare to LQCD results, finding an excellent qualitative agreement. In particular, we show that the transverse pressure, as a function of the field strength, is always negative for temperatures below the transition temperature whereas it starts off being positive and then becomes negative for temperatures above the transition temperature, also in agreement with LQCD results. We also show that for the longitudinal pressure to agree with LQCD calculations, the system should be described as a diamagnet. We argue that the turnover of M and G as functions of temperature and field strength is a key element that drives the behavior of the quark condensate going across the transition temperature and provides clues for a better understanding of the inverse magnetic catalysis phenomenon.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

The pseudo chiral magnetic effect in QED3

Chiral magnetic effect (CME) has been suggested to take place during peripheral relativistic heavy ion collisions. However, signals of its realization are not yet independent of ambiguities and thus probing the non-trivial topological vacua of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) is still an open issue. Weyl materials, particularly graphene, on the other hand, are effectively described at low energies by the degrees of freedom of quantum electrodynamics in two spatial dimensions, QED3. This theory shares with QCD some interesting features, like confinement and chiral symmetry breaking and also possesses a non-trivial vacuum structure. In this regard, an analog of the CME is proposed to take place in graphene under the influence of an in-plane magnetic field in which the pseudo-spin or flavor label of charge carriers is participant of the effect, rather than the actual spin. In this contribution, we review the parallelisms and differences between the CME and the so-called pseudo chiral magnetic effect, PCME.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Weak magnetic field effects on chiral critical temperature in a nonlocal Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model

In this article we study the nonlocal Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model with a Gaussian regulator in the chiral limit. Finite temperature effects and the presence of a homogeneous magnetic field are considered. The magnetic evolution of the critical temperature for chiral symmetry restoration is then obtained. Here we restrict ourselves to the case of low magnetic field values, being this a complementary discussion to the exisiting analysis in nonlocal models in the strong magnetic field regime.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2014

On the magnetic catalysis and inverse catalysis of phase transitions in the linear sigma model

We consider the evolution of critical temperature both for the formation of a pion condensate as well as for the chiral transition, from the perspective of the linear sigma model, in the background of a magnetic field. We developed the discussion for the pion condensate in one loop approximation for the effective potential getting magnetic catalysis for high values of B, i.e. a raising of the critical temperature with the magnetic field. For the analysis of the chiral restoration, we go beyond this approximation, by taking one loop thermo-magnetic corrections to the couplings as well as plasma screening effects for the boson's masses, expressed through the resumation of ring diagrams. Here we found the opposite behavior, i.e. inverse magnetica catalysis, i.e. a decreasing of the chiral critical temperature as function of the intensity of the magnetic field, which seems to be in agreement with recent results form the lattice community.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2014

Thermodynamic instabilities in nonlocal NJL models

It has been recently pointed out, that nonlocal Nambu--Jona-Lasinio models, may present unphysical thermodynamical behavior like negative pressure and oscillating entropy. Here we show how these thermodynamic instabilities can be related to the analytical structure of the poles of the quark propagator in the model. The analysis is carried out for two different regulators and we show, in each case, how the instabilities are related to the pressence of highly unstable poles. We also argue that the softening of these instabilities by the inclusion of the Polyakov loop is related to the effect the latter has on the poles of the propagator.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2013

The Linear Sigma Model and the formation of a charged pion condensate in the presence of an external magnetic field

We discuss the charged pion condensation phenomenon in the linear sigma model, in the presence of an external uniform magnetic field. The critical temperature is obtained as a function of the external magnetic field, assuming the transition is of second order, by considering a dilute gas at low temperature. As a result we found magnetic anti-catalysis in the Bose-Einstein condensation for lower values of the external magnetic field, and catalysis for higher values of the external magnetic field. This behavior confirms previous results with a single charged scalar field.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2013

The nNJL model with a fractional Lorentzian regulator in the real time formalism

In this article we study the finite temperature and chemical potential effects in a nonlocal Nambu-Jona-Lasinio (nNJL) model in the real time formalism. We make the usual Wick rotation to get from imaginary to real time formalism. In doing so, we need to define our regulator in the complex plane q^2. This deffinition will be crucial in our later analysis. We study the poles in the propagator of this model and conclude that only some of them are of interst to us. Once we have a well defined model in real time formalism, we look at the chiral condensate to find the temperature at which chiral symmetry restoration will occur. We find a second order phase transition that turns to a first order one for high enough values of the chemical potential.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2012

Magnetic catalysis of a charged Bose-Einstein condensate

We study the condensation phenomenon for a system of charged bosons in the presence of an external magnetic field. We show that condensation happens for a definite critical temperature instead of through a diffuse phase transition. The essential ingredient, overlooked in previous analyses and accounted for in this work, is the treatment of the plasma screening effects by means of resummation. We compute the critical temperature, for the case in which the condensate is made of charged pions and for typical densities found in compact astrophysical objects, for small and large values of the magnetic field. We show that the magnetic field catalyzes the onset of condensation at very small and at large values of the magnetic field, and that for intermediate values, the critical temperature for condensation is lower than for the zero magnetic field case.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2011

Pion stability in a hot dense media

Pions may remain stable under certain conditions in a dense media at zero temperature in the normal phase (non pion superfluid state). The stability condition is achieved when the in-media pion width vanishes. However, thermal fluctuations will change this stable regime. For low temperature pions will remain in a metastable state. Here we discuss the different possible scenarios for leptonic pion decays at finite temperature, taking into account all the different chemical potentials involved. The neutrino emission due to pions in a hot-dense media is calculated, as well as the coolig rate of a pion-lepton gas.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2011

Thermal nonlocal Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model in the real time formalism

The real-time formalism at finite temperature and chemical potential for the nonlocal Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model is developed in the presence of a Gaussian covariant regulator. We construct the most general thermal propagator, by means of the spectral function. As a result, the model involves the propagation of massive quasiparticles. The appearance of complex poles is interpreted as a confinement signal, and in this case we have unstable quasiparticles with a finite decay width. An expression for the propagator along the critical line, where complex poles start to appear, is also obtained. A generalization to other covariant regulators is proposed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2010

Weinberg power counting and the quark determinant at small chemical potential

We construct an effective action for QCD by expanding the quark determinant in powers of the chemical potential at finite temperature in the case of massless quarks. To cut the infinite series we adopt the Weinberg power counting criteria. We compute the minimal effective action (~p^4), expanding in the external momentum, which implies the use of the hard thermal loop approximation. Our main result is a gauge invariant expression for the phase theta of the functional determinant in QCD, and recovers dimensional reduction in the high-temperature limit. We compute, analytically, in the range of p << 2 pi T, including perturbative and nonperturbative contributions, the latter treated within the mean field approximation. Implications for lattice simulations are briefly discussed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Deconfinement of neutron star matter within the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model

We study the deconfinement transition of hadronic matter into quark matter under neutron star conditions assuming color and flavor conservation during the transition. We use a two-phase description. For the hadronic phase we use different parameterizations of a non-linear Walecka model which includes the whole baryon octet. For the quark matter phase we use an SU(3)_f Nambu-Jona-Lasinio effective model including color superconductivity. Deconfinement is considered to be a first order phase transition that conserves color and flavor. It gives a short-lived transitory colorless-quark-phase that is not in beta-equilibrium, and decays to a stable configuration in tau ~ tau_{weak} ~ 10^{-8} s. However, in spite of being very short lived, the transition to this intermediate phase determines the onset of the transition inside neutron stars. We find the transition free-energy density for temperatures typical of neutron star interiors. We also find the critical mass above which compact stars should contain a quark core and below which they are safe with respect to a sudden transition to quark matter. Rather independently on the stiffness of the hadronic equation of state (EOS) we find that the critical mass of hadronic stars (without trapped neutrinos) is in the range of ~ 1.5 - 1.8 solar masses. This is in coincidence with previous results obtained within the MIT Bag model.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2009

Quark mass and isospin dependence of the deconfining critical temperature

We describe the deconfining critical temperature dependence on the pion mass and on the isospin chemical potential in remarkably good agreement with lattice data. Our framework incorporates explicit dependence on quark masses, isospin and baryonic chemical potentials for the case of two flavors through ingredients from well-known high- and low-energy theories. In the low-energy sector, the system is described by a minimal chiral perturbation theory effective action, corresponding to a hot gas of pion quasiparticles and heavy nucleons. For the high-temperature sector we adopt a simple extension of the fuzzy bag model. We also briefly discuss the effects of mass asymmetry and baryon chemical potential.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2008

Mass and chemical asymmetry in QCD matter

We consider two-flavor asymmetric QCD combined with a low-energy effective model inspired by chiral perturbation theory and lattice data to investigate the effects of masses, isospin and baryon number on the pressure and the deconfinement phase transition. Remarkable agreement with lattice results is found for the critical temperature behavior. Further analyses of the cold, dense case and the influence of quark mass asymmetry are also presented.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2006

QCD Effective action at high temperature and small chemical potential

We present a construction of an effective Yang-Mills action for QCD, from the expansion of the fermionic determinant in terms of powers of the chemical potential at high temperature, for the case of massless quarks. We analyze this expansion in the perturbative region and find that it gives extra spurious information. We propose for the non-perturbative sector a simplified effective action which, in principle, contains only the relevant information.

hep-ph↗