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Heng-Tong Ding

Publications and source records attributed to Heng-Tong Ding.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

Meson masses in external magnetic fields with HISQ fermions

We studied the temporal correlation function of mesons in the pseudo-scalar channel in (2+1)-flavor QCD in the presence of external magnetic fields at zero temperature. The simulations were performed on $32^3 \times 96$ lattices using the Highly Improved Staggered Quarks (HISQ) action with $m_π \approx $ 230 MeV. The strength of magnetic fields $|eB|$ ranges from 0 to around 3.3 GeV$^2$ ($\sim 60 m_π^2$). We found that the masses of neutral pseudo-scalar particles, e.g. neutral pion and kaon, monotonouslly decrease as the magnetic field grows and then saturate at a nonzero value. It is observed that heavier neutral pseudo-scalars are less affected by magnetic fields. Moreover, we found a non-monotonous behavior of charged pion and kaon mass in magnetic field for the first time. In the case of small magnetic field (0 $\leq~|eB| \lesssim$ 0.3 GeV$^2~\sim 6m_π^2$ ) the mass of charged pseudo-scalar grows with magnetic field and can be well described by the Lowest Landau Level approximation, while for $|eB|$ larger than 0.3 GeV$^2$ the mass starts to decrease. The possible connection between $|eB|$ dependences of neutral pion mass and the decreasing behavior of pseudo-critical temperature in magnetic field is discussed. Due to the nonzero value of neutral pion mass our simulation indicates that the superconducting phase of QCD does not exist in the current window of magnetic field.

hep-lat↗

Meson Screening Masses in (2+1)-Flavor QCD

We present lattice QCD results for mesonic screening masses in the temperature range 140 MeV $\lesssim T \lesssim$ 2500 MeV. Our calculations were carried out using (2+1)-flavors of the Highly Improved Staggered Quark (HISQ) action, with a physical value for the strange quark mass and two values of the light quark mass corresponding to pion masses of 160 MeV and 140 MeV. Continuum-extrapolated results were obtained using calculations with a variety of lattice spacings corresponding to temporal lattice extents $N_τ= 6 - 16$. We discuss the implications of these results for the effective restoration of various symmetries in the high temperature phase of QCD, as well as the approach toward the perturbative limit.

hep-lat↗

Chiral phase transition in (2 + 1)-flavor QCD

The chiral phase transition temperature $T_{c}^{0}$ is a fundamental quantity of QCD. To determine this quantity we have performed simulations of (2 + 1)-flavor QCD using the Highly Improved Staggered Quarks (HISQ/tree) action on $N_τ=6, 8$ and 12 lattices with aspect ratios $N_σ/N_τ$ ranging from 4 to 8. In our simulations the strange quark mass is fixed to its physical value $m_{s}^{\rm{phy}}$, and the values of two degenerate light quark masses $m_{l}$ are varied from $m_{s}^{\rm{phy}}/20$ to $m_{s}^{\rm{phy}}/160$ which correspond to a Goldstone pion mass $m_π$ ranging from 160 MeV to 55 MeV in the continuum limit. By investigating the light quark mass dependence and the volume dependence of various chiral observables, e.g. chiral susceptibilities and Binder cumulants, no evidence for a first order phase transition in our current quark mass window is found. Two estimators $T_{60}$ and $T_δ$ are proposed to extract the chiral phase transition temperature $T_{c}^{0}$ in the chiral and continuum limit and our current estimate for $T_{c}^{0}$ is $132_{-6}^{+3}$ MeV.

hep-lat↗

Phase structure of three flavor QCD in external magnetic fields using HISQ fermions

We study the phase structure of QCD with three degenerate flavors in the external magnetic fields using highly improved staggered quarks (HISQ). The simulations are performed on $16^3\times 6$ lattice. In order to investigate the quark mass dependence of the chiral transition we choose the values of the bare quark masses 0.015 and 0.0009375 in the lattice unit, corresponding to $m_π=320$ MeV and 80 MeV in the continuum limit. We found no indication of a first order phase transition in the current window of quark masses and external magnetic fields. Unlike to the case with standard staggered fermions inverse magnetic catalysis is always observed at about the critical temperature. The microscopic origin of this phenomena are further discussed by looking into the Dirac eigenvalue spectrum.

hep-lat↗

Continuum extrapolation of quarkonium correlators at non-zero temperature

In the investigation of in-medium modifications of quarkonia and for determining heavy quark diffusion coefficients, correlation functions play a crucial role. For the first time we perform a continuum extrapolation of charmonium and bottomonium correlators in the vector channel based on non-perturbatively clover-improved Wilson fermions in quenched lattice QCD. Calculations were done at 4 different lattice spacings, spatial extents between 96 and 192, aspect ratio from 1/6 to 1/2, for 5 temperatures between $T/T_c = 0.75$ and $T/T_c = 2.2$. We interpolate between different quark masses to match to the same vector meson mass over different lattice setups. Afterwards we extrapolate the renormalized correlators to the continuum. While we find a strong temperature dependence for charmonium, bottomonium states are only slightly affected at higher temperatures.

hep-lat↗

Charmonium and bottomonium spectral functions in the vector channel

In this paper we report our results on quarkonium spectral functions in the vector channel obtained from quenched lattice QCD simulations at $T\in[0.75, 2.25]~T_c$. The calculations have been performed on very large and fine isotropic lattices where both charm and bottom quarks can be treated relativistically. The spectral functions are reconstructed using the Maximum Entropy Method. We study the dissociation of quarkonium states from the temperature dependence of the spectral functions and estimate heavy quark diffusion coefficients using the low-frequency behavior of the vector spectral functions.

hep-lat↗

Stochastic reconstructions of spectral functions: Application to lattice QCD

We present a detailed study of the applications of two stochastic approaches, stochastic optimization method (SOM) and stochastic analytical inference (SAI), to extract spectral functions from Euclidean correlation functions. SOM has the advantage that it does not require prior information. On the other hand, SAI is a more generalized method based on Bayesian inference. Under mean field approximation SAI reduces to the often-used maximum entropy method (MEM), and for a specific choice of the prior SAI becomes equivalent to SOM. To test the applicability of these two stochastic methods to lattice QCD, firstly, we apply these methods to various reasonably chosen model correlation functions, and present detailed comparisons of the reconstructed spectral functions obtained from SOM, SAI and MEM. Next, we present similar studies for charmonia correlation functions obtained from lattice QCD computations using clover-improved Wilson fermions on large, fine, isotropic lattices at $0.75$ and $1.5T_c$, $T_c$ being the deconfinement transition temperature of a pure gluon plasma. We find that SAI and SOM give consistent results to MEM at these two temperatures.

hep-lat↗

Chiral phase transition of three flavor QCD with nonzero magnetic field using standard staggered fermions

Lattice simulations for (2+1)-flavor QCD with external magnetic field demonstrated that the quark mass is one of the important parameters responsible for the (inverse) magnetic catalysis. We discuss the dependences of chiral condensates and susceptibilities, the Polyakov loop on the magnetic field and quark mass in three degenerate flavor QCD. The lattice simulations are performed using standard staggered fermions and the plaquette action with spatial sizes Ns = 16 and 24 and a fixed temporal size Nt = 4. The value of the quark masses are chosen such that the system undergoes a first order chiral phase transition and crossover with zero magnetic field. We find that in light mass regime, the quark chiral condensate undergoes magnetic catalysis in the whole temperature region and the phase transition tend to become stronger as the magnetic field increases. In crossover regime, deconfinement transition temperature is shifted by the magnetic field when quark mass ma is less than 0.4. The lattice cutoff effects are also discussed.

hep-lat↗

Thermal modifications of charmonia and bottomonia from spatial correlation functions

We present our study on the thermal modifications of charmonia and bottomonia from spatial correlation functions at zero and nonzero momenta in quenched QCD. To accommodate the heavy quarks on the lattice we performed simulations on very fine lattices at a fixed beta value corresponding to a lattice spacing $a^{-1}=22.8$ GeV on $192^3\times32$, $192^3\times48$, $192^3\times56$, $192^3\times64$ and $192^3\times96$ lattices using clover-improved Wilson fermions. These lattices correspond to temperatures of $2.25 T_c$, $1.50 T_c$, $1.25 T_c$, $1.10 T_c$ and $0.75 T_c$. To increase the signal to noise ratio in the axial-vector and scalar channels we used multi-sources for the measurement of spatial correlation functions. By investigating on the differences between spatial and temporal correlators as well as the temperature dependence of screening masses we will discuss the thermal effects in different channels of quarkonium states. Besides this the dispersion relation of the screening mass at different momenta is also discussed.

hep-lat↗

Chiral phase transition of (2 + 1)-flavor QCD on $N_τ = 6$ lattices

We present updated studies on the chiral phase transition in $N_{f}=2+1$ QCD. Simulations have been carried out using Highly Improved Staggered Quarks (HISQ) on lattices with temporal extent $N_τ = 6$ at vanishing baryon chemical potential. We updated our previous study \cite{Ding:2015pmg} by extending the temperature window from (140 MeV, 150 MeV) to (140 MeV, 170 MeV). The strange quark mass was chosen to its physical value $m_{s}^{\mathrm{phy}}$, and five values of two degenerate light quark masses are varied from $m_{s}^{\mathrm{phy}}/80$ to $m_{s}^{\mathrm{phy}}/20$ which correspond to a Goldstone pion mass ranging from 80 MeV to 160 MeV in the continuum limit. The universal scaling behaviour of the QCD chiral phase transition is investigated by studying the temperature and quark mass dependences of chiral condensates and chiral susceptibilities. The window of criticality compared to previous studies is also discussed.

hep-lat↗

Lattice QCD at nonzero temperature and density

In this talk I review the current status of lattice QCD calculations at nonzero temperature and density. I focus on the QCD phase structure and bulk QCD thermodynamics at zero and nonzero chemical potentials.

hep-lat↗

Thermal dilepton rates and electrical conductivity of the QGP from the lattice

We investigate the temperature dependence of the thermal dilepton rate and the electrical conductivity of the gluon plasma at temperatures of $1.1T_c$, $1.3T_c$ and $1.5T_c$ in quenched QCD. Making use of non-perturbatively clover-improved Wilson valence quarks allows for a clean extrapolation of the vector meson correlation function to the continuum limit. We found that the vector correlation function divided by $T^3$ is almost temperature independent in the current temperature window. The spectral functions are obtained by $χ^2$ fitting of phenomenologically inspired Ansätze for the spectral function to the continuum extrapolated correlator data, where the correlations between the data points have been included. Systematic uncertainties arising from varying the Ansätze motivated from strong coupling theory as well as perturbation theory are discussed and estimated. We found that the electrical conductivity of the hot medium, related to the slope of the vector spectral function at zero frequency and momentum, is $0.2C_{em}\lesssim σ/T\lesssim0.7C_{em}$ for $T=1.1T_c$ and $0.2C_{em}\lesssim σ/T\lesssim0.4C_{em}$ for the higher temperatures. The dilepton rates and soft photon rates, resulting from the obtained spectral functions, show no significant temperature dependence, either.

hep-lat↗

The curvature of the chiral phase transition line for small values of $μ_B$

We present preliminary results from an ongoing calculation to determine the curvature of the chiral phase transition line in the chiral limit along the light-light, light-strange and strange-strange chemical potential directions. We do this by studying the appropriate $μ$-derivatives of the chiral condensate as a function of the quark mass and comparing them to the scaling predictions of $3d$-$O(N)$ theory. We work at a fixed lattice spacing, $N_τ=6$ and at four different quark masses $m_π\approx$ 140, 110, 90 and 80 MeV. For the light quark curvature, we obtain a value 0.03$\leqslantκ_{ll}\leqslant$0.11. We also find that both strange and light-strange curvatures are around an order of magnitude smaller. Currently, the light-strange curvature is the least constrained curvature and could have either sign, though our results seem to prefer a slightly negative value.

hep-lat↗

Chiral phase transition of $N_f$=2+1 and 3 QCD at vanishing baryon chemical potential

We present updated results on chiral phase structure in (2+1)-flavor ($N_f$=2+1) and 3-flavor ($N_f=3$) QCD based on the simulations using Highly Improved Staggered Quarks on lattices with temporal extent $N_τ$ =6 at vanishing baryon chemical potential. In $N_f$=2+1 QCD we have performed simulations with a strange quark fixed to its physical value and two degenerate light quarks whose values are adjusted to have 5 values of Goldstone pion masses in the region of 160 - 80 MeV in the continuum limit. The universal scaling behavior of chiral condensates as well as chiral susceptibilities is discussed and the tri-critical point is suggested to be located below the physical point, i.e. at smaller than physical strange quark mass. In $N_f$=3 QCD simulations with 6 different masses of 3 degenerate quarks corresponding to the Goldstone pion masses in the region of 230 - 80 MeV have also been performed. Our results suggest that the QCD transition with these values of quark masses is of crossover type and an upper bound of the critical pion mass where the first order phase transition starts is estimated to be about 50 MeV.

hep-lat↗

Physics perspectives of heavy-ion collisions at very high energy

Heavy-ion collisions at very high colliding energies are expected to produce a quark-gluon plasma (QGP) at the highest temperature obtainable in a laboratory setting. Experimental studies of these reactions can provide an unprecedented range of information on properties of the QGP at high temperatures. We report theoretical investigations of the physics perspectives of heavy-ion collisions at a future high-energy collider. These include initial parton production, collective expansion of the dense medium, jet quenching, heavy-quark transport, dissociation and regeneration of quarkonia, photon and dilepton production. We illustrate the potential of future experimental studies of the initial particle production and formation of QGP at the highest temperature to provide constraints on properties of strongly interaction matter.

nucl-th↗

A stochastic approach to the reconstruction of spectral functions in lattice QCD

We present a Stochastic Optimization Method (SOM) for the reconstruction of the spectral functions (SPFs) from Euclidean correlation functions. In this approach the SPF is parameterized as a sum of randomly distributed boxes. By varying the width, location and height of the boxes stochastically an optimal SPF can be obtained. Using this approach we reproduce mock SPFs fairly well, which contain sharp resonance peaks, transport peaks and continuum spectra. We also analyzed the charmonium correlators obtained from $N_τ$=96, 48, 32 lattices using SOM and found similar conclusion on the dissociation temperatures of charmonium ground states as that obtained using the Maximum Entropy Method.

hep-lat↗

Thermodynamics of strong-interaction matter from Lattice QCD

We review results from lattice QCD calculations on the thermodynamics of strong-interaction matter with emphasis on input these calculations can provide to the exploration of the phase diagram and properties of hot and dense matter created in heavy ion experiments. This review is organized as follows: 1) Introduction, 2) QCD thermodynamics on the lattice, 3) QCD phase diagram at high temperature, 4) Bulk thermodynamics, 5) Fluctuations of conserved charges, 6) Transport properties, 7) Open heavy flavors and heavy quarkonia, 8) QCD in external magnetic fields, 9) Summary.

hep-lat↗

Thermodynamics of heavy-light hadrons

Ratios of cumulants of conserved net charge fluctuations are sensitive to the degrees of freedom that are carriers of the corresponding quantum numbers in different phases of strong interaction matter. We calculate second and fourth order cumulants of net charm and strange fluctuations and their correlations with other conserved charges such as net baryon number and electric charge. Simulation are performed on $N_τ$=6 and 8 lattices using the Highly Improved Staggered Quark (HISQ) action with a light to strange quark mass ratio of 1/20 and having charm quarks treated in the quenched approximation. Analysing appropriate ratios of these cumulants we observe that both open strange and charm hadrons start to get dissociated in the chiral crossover region. We provide indirect evidence for the existence of additional, experimentally yet unobserved open charm and strange hadrons from QCD thermodynamics. This is done by comparing lattice QCD results to Hadron Resonance Gas (HRG) model calculations performed with a hadron spectrum as listed in the Particle Data Tables as well as with a spectrum predicted in the relativistic quark model and observed in lattice QCD calculations. We also discuss the influence of these experimentally yet unobserved states on the determination of freeze-out temperature and chemical potentials from heavy ion collision experiments. We found that including these additional states in the HRG model leads to a systematic 5-8 MeV decrease in the freeze-out temperature of strange hadrons.

hep-lat↗