arXiv subjects

L. A. Hernandez

Publications and source records attributed to L. A. Hernandez.

18 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Stellar occultation observations of (38628) Huya and its satellite: a detailed look into the system

The physical and orbital parameters of Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNOs) provide valuable information about the Solar System's formation and evolution. In particular, the characterization of binaries provides insights into the formation mechanisms that may be playing a role at such large distances from the Sun. Studies show two distinct populations, and (38628) Huya occupies an intermediate position between the unequal-size binaries and those with components of roughly equal sizes. In this work, we predicted and observed three stellar occultation events by Huya. Huya and its satellite - S/2012 (38628) 1 - were detected during occultations in March 2021 and again in June 2023. Additionally, an attempt to detect Huya in February 2023 resulted in an additional single-chord detection of the secondary. A spherical body with a minimum diameter of D = 165 km can explain the three single-chord observations and provide a lower limit for the satellite size. The astrometry of Huya's system, as derived from the occultations and supplemented by observations from the Hubble Space Telescope and Keck Observatory, provided constraints on the satellite orbit and the mass of the system. Therefore, assuming the secondary is in an equatorial orbit around the primary, the limb fitting was constrained by the satellite orbit position angle. The system density, calculated by summing the most precise measurement of Huya's volume to the spherical satellite average volume, is $ρ_{1}$ = 1073 $\pm$ 66 kg m$^{-3}$. The density that the object would have assuming a Maclaurin equilibrium shape with a rotational period of 6.725 $\pm$ 0.01 hours is $ρ_{2}$ = 768 $\pm$ 42 kg m$^{-3}$. This difference rules out the Maclaurin equilibrium assumption for the main body shape.

astro-ph.EP↗

arXiv2020

Thermal corrections to the gluon magnetic Debye mass

We compute the gluon polarization tensor in a thermo-magnetic environment in the strong magnetic field limit at zero and high temperature. The magnetic field effects are introduced using Schwinger's proper time method. Thermal effects are computed in the HTL approximation. At zero temperature, we reproduce the well-known result whereby for a non-vanishing quark mass, the polarization tensor reduces to the parallel structure and its coefficient develops an imaginary part corresponding to the threshold for quark-antiquark pair production. This coefficient is infrared finite and simplifies considerably when the quark mass vanishes. Keeping always the field strength as the largest energy scale, in the high temperature regime we analyze two complementary hierarchies of scales: $q^2\ll m_f^2\ll T^2$ and $m_f^2\ll q^2\ll T^2$. In the latter, we show that the polarization tensor is infrared finite as $m_f$ goes to zero. In the former, we discuss the thermal corrections to the magnetic Debye mass.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2018

Thermo-magnetic evolution of the QCD strong coupling

We study the one-loop gluon polarization tensor at zero and finite temperature in the presence of a magnetic field, to extract the thermo-magnetic evolution of the strong coupling $α_s$. We analyze four distinct regimes, to wit, the small and large field cases, both at zero and at high temperature. From a renormalization group analysis we show that at zero temperature, either for small or large magnetic fields, and for a fixed transferred momentum $Q^2$, $α_s$ grows with the field strength with respect to its vacuum value. However, at high temperature and also for a fixed value of $Q^2$ we find two different cases: When the magnetic field is even larger than the squared temperature, $α_s$ also grows with the field strength. On the contrary, when the squared temperature is larger than the magnetic field, a turnover behavior occurs and $α_s$ decreases with the field strength. This thermo-magnetic behavior of $α_s$ can help explain the inverse magnetic catalysis phenomenon found by lattice QCD calculations.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Locating the critical end point using the linear sigma model coupled to quarks

We use the linear sigma model coupled to quarks to compute the effective potential beyond the mean field approximation, including the contribution of the ring diagrams at finite temperature and baryon density. We determine the model couplings and use them to study the phase diagram in the baryon chemical potential-temperature plane and to locate the Critical End Point.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Thermomagnetic correlation lengths of strongly interacting matter in the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model

We study the correlation length between test quarks with the same electric and color charges in the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model, considering thermal and magnetic effects. We extract the correlation length from the quark correlation function. The latter is constructed from the probability amplitude to bring a given quark into the plasma, once a previous one with the same quantum numbers is placed at a given distance apart. For temperatures below the transition temperature, the correlation length starts growing as the field strength increases to then decrease for large magnetic fields. For temperatures above the critical temperature, the correlation length continues increasing as the field strength increases. We found that such behavior can be understood as a competition between the tightening induced by the classical magnetic force versus the random thermal motion. For large enough temperatures, the increase of the occupation number contributes to the screening of the interaction between the test particles. The growth of the correlation distance with the magnetic field can be understood as due to the closer proximity between one of the test quarks and the ones popped up from vacuum, which in turn appear due to the increase of the occupation number with temperature.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Prompt photon yield and elliptic flow from gluon fusion induced by magnetic fields in relativistic heavy-ion collisions

We compute photon production at early times in semi-central relativistic heavy-ion collisions from non-equilibrium gluon fusion induced by a magnetic field. The calculation accounts for the main features of the collision at these early times, namely, the intense magnetic field and the high gluon occupation number. The gluon fusion channel is made possible by the magnetic field and would otherwise be forbidden due to charge conjugation invariance. Thus, the photon yield from this process is an excess over calculations without magnetic field effects. We compare this excess to the difference between PHENIX data and recent hydrodynamic calculations for the photon transverse momentum distribution and elliptic flow coefficient $v_2$. We show that with reasonable values for the saturation scale and magnetic field strength, the calculation helps to better describe the experimental results obtained at RHIC energies for the lowest part of the transverse photon momentum.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Electromagnetic proton form factors in dual large-$N_c$ QCD: an update

An updated determination is presented of the electric and magnetic form factors of the proton, in the framework of a dual-model realization of QCD in the limit of an infinite number of colors. Very good agreement with data is obtained in the space-like region up to $ q^2 \simeq - \,30 \,{GeV}^2$. In particular, the ratio $μ_P \, G_E(q^2) / G_M(q^2)$ is predicted in very good agreement with recoil polarization measurements from Jefferson Lab, up to $q^2 \simeq - 8.5 \,{GeV}^2$. \end{abstract}

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Determination of the temperature dependence of the up- down-quark mass in QCD

The temperature dependence of the sum of the QCD up- and down-quark masses, $(m_u + m_d)$ and the pion decay constant, $f_π$, are determined from two thermal finite energy QCD sum rules for the pseudoscalar-current correlator. This quark-mass remains mostly constant for temperatures well below the critical temperature for deconfinement/chiral-symmetry restoration. As this critical temperature is approached, the quark-mass increases sharply with increasing temperature. This increase is far more pronounced if the temperature dependence of the pion mass (determined independently from other methods) is taken into account. The behavior of $f_π(T)$ is consistent with the expectation from chiral symmetry, i.e. that it should follow the thermal dependence of the quark condensate, independently of the quark mass.

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

Tests of quark-hadron duality in tau-decays

An exhaustive number of QCD finite energy sum rules for $τ$-decay together with the latest updated ALEPH data is used to test the assumption of global duality. Typical checks are the absence of the dimension $d=2$ condensate, the equality of the gluon condensate extracted from vector or axial vector spectral functions, the Weinberg sum rules, the chiral condensates of dimensions $d=6$ and $d=8$, as well as the extraction of some low-energy parameters of chiral perturbation theory. Suitable pinched linear integration kernels are introduced in the sum rules in order to suppress potential quark-hadron duality violations and experimental errors. We find no compelling indications of duality violations in hadronic $τ$-decay in the kinematic region above $s\simeq2.2$ GeV$^{2}$ for these kernels.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Tau-decay hadronic spectral functions: probing quark-hadron duality

The vector and axial-vector ALEPH hadronic spectral functions from $τ$-decay are used to probe potential quark-hadron duality violations (DV). This is done in the framework of finite energy QCD sum rules (FESR). A pinched integration kernel is introduced in the FESR in order to (a) quench potential duality violations on the real axis in the complex squared energy $s$-plane, and (b) effectively extend the analysis well beyond the kinematical $τ$-decay end-point where there is no longer data, i.e.\ in the range $s = 3 - 10 \,{\mbox{GeV}}^2$. In the vector channel this procedure is supplemented with actual data from $e^+ e^-$-annihilation into hadrons, above the tau-decay kinematical end-point, with results fully supporting this extension. Very good agreement is obtained between data and two specific pinched FESR. Results from this analysis are confronted with those from a specific model of DV. As the sum rules are well satisfied in both cases within experimental errors, we conclude that possible DV must be buried under the experimental uncertainties. In other words, there seems to be no need for explicit models of DV in this case. Pinched kernels work as well, but with far less free parameters.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Quark-hadron duality: pinched kernel approch

Hadronic spectral functions measured by the ALEPH collaboration in the vector and axial-vector channels are used to study potential quark-hadron duality violations (DV). This is done entirely in the framework of pinched kernel finite energy sum rules (FESR), i.e. in a model independent fashion. The kinematical range of the ALEPH data is effectively extended up to $s = 10\; {\mbox{GeV}^2}$ by using an appropriate kernel, and assuming that in this region the spectral functions are given by perturbative QCD. Support for this assumption is obtained by using $e^+ e^-$ annihilation data in the vector channel. Results in both channels show a good saturation of the pinched FESR, without further need of explicit models of DV.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Inverse magnetic catalysis from the properties of the QCD coupling in a magnetic field

We compute the vacuum one-loop quark-gluon vertex correction at zero temperature in the presence of a magnetic field. From the vertex function we extract the effective quark-gluon coupling and show that it grows with increasing magnetic field strength. The effect is due to a subtle competition between the color charge associated to gluons and the color charge associated to quarks, the former being larger than the latter. In contrast, at high temperature the effective thermo-magnetic coupling results exclusively from the contribution of the color charge associated to quarks. This produces a decrease of the coupling with increasing field strength. We interpret the results in terms of a geometrical effect whereby the magnetic field induces, on average, a closer distance between the (electrically charged) quarks and antiquarks. At high temperature, since the effective coupling is proportional only to the color charge associated to quarks, such proximity with increasing field strength makes the effective coupling decrease due to asymptotic freedom. In turn, this leads to a decreasing quark condensate. In contrast, at zero temperature both the effective strong coupling and the quark condensate increase with increasing magnetic field. This is due to the color charge associated to gluons dominating over that associated to quarks, with both having the opposite sign. Thus, the gluons induce a kind of screening of the quark color charge, in spite of the quark-antiquark proximity. The implications of these results for the inverse magnetic catalysis phenomenon are discussed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Thermal photon production from gluon fusion induced by magnetic fields in relativistic heavy-ion collisions

We compute the production of thermal photons in relativistic heavy-ion collisions by gluon fusion in the presence of an intense magnetic field, and during the early stages of the reaction. This photon yield is an excess over calculations that do not consider magnetic field effects. We add this excess to recent hydrodynamic calculations that are close to describing the experimental transverse momentum distribution in RHIC and LHC. We then show that with reasonable values for the temperature, magnetic field strength, and strong coupling constant, our results provide a very good description of such excess. These results support the idea that the origin of at least some of the photon excess observed in heavy-ion experiments may arise from magnetic field induced processes.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

The magnetized effective QCD phase diagram

The QCD phase diagram in the temperature versus quark chemical potential plane is studied in the presence of a magnetic field, using the linear sigma model coupled to quarks. It is shown that the decrease of the couplings with increasing field strength obtained in this model leads to the critical temperature for the phase transition to decrease with increasing field intensity (inverse magnetic catalysis). This happens provided that plasma screening is properly accounted for. It is also found that with increasing field strength the location of the critical end point (CEP) in the phase diagram moves toward lower values of the critical quark chemical potential and larger values of the critical temperature. In addition, the CEP approaches the temperature axis for large values of the magnetic field. We argue that a similar behavior is to be expected in QCD, since the physical impact of the magnetic field, regardless of strength, is to produce a spatial dimension reduction, whereby virtual quark-antiquark pairs are closer on average and thus, the strength of their interaction decreases due to asymptotic freedom.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Quark deconfinement and gluon condensate in a weak magnetic field

We study QCD finite energy sum rules (FESR) for the axial-vector current correlator in the presence of a magnetic field, in the weak field limit and at zero temperature. We find that the perturbative QCD as well as the hadronic contribution to the sum rules get explicit magnetic field-dependent corrections and that these in turn induce a magnetic field dependence on the deconfinement phenomenological parameter s_0 and on the gluon condensate. The leading corrections turn out to be quadratic in the field strength. We find from the dimension d=2 first FESR that the magnetic field dependence of s_0 is proportional to the absolute value of the light-quark condensate. Hence, it increases with increasing field strength. This implies that the parameters describing chiral symmetry restoration and deconfinement behave similarly as functions of the magnetic filed. Thus, at zero temperature the magnetic field is a catalysing agent of both chiral symmetry breaking and confinement. From the dimension d=4 second FESR we obtain the behavior of the gluon condensate in the presence of the external magnetic field. This condensate also increases with increasing field strength.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Determination of the gluon condensate from data in the charm-quark region

The gluon condensate, $\langle \frac{α_s}π G^2 \rangle$, i.e. the leading order power correction in the operator product expansion of current correlators in QCD at short distances, is determined from $e^+ e^-$ annihilation data in the charm-quark region. This determination is based on finite energy QCD sum rules, weighted by a suitable integration kernel to (i) account for potential quark-hadron duality violations, (ii) enhance the contribution of the well known first two narrow resonances, the $J/ψ$ and the $ψ(2S)$, while quenching substantially the data region beyond, and (iii) reinforce the role of the gluon condensate in the sum rules. By using a kernel exhibiting a singularity at the origin, the gluon condensate enters the Cauchy residue at the pole through the low energy QCD expansion of the vector current correlator. These features allow for a reasonably precise determination of the condensate, i.e. $\langle \frac{α_s}π G^2 \rangle =0.037 \,\pm\, 0.015 \;{\mbox{GeV}}^4$.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Chiral sum rules and vacuum condensates from tau-lepton decay data

QCD finite energy sum rules, together with the latest updated ALEPH data on hadronic decays of the tau-lepton are used in order to determine the vacuum condensates of dimension $d=2$ and $d=4$. These data are also used to check the validity of the Weinberg sum rules, and to determine the chiral condensates of dimension $d=6$ and $d=8$, as well as the chiral correlator at zero momentum, proportional to the counter term of the ${\cal{O}}(p^4)$ Lagrangian of chiral perturbation theory, $\bar{L}_{10}$. Suitable (pinched) integration kernels are introduced in the sum rules in order to suppress potential quark-hadron duality violations. We find no compelling indications of duality violations in the kinematic region above $s \simeq 2.2$ GeV$^2$ after using pinched integration kernels.

hep-ph↗