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M. A. Stephanov

Publications and source records attributed to M. A. Stephanov.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
arXiv2003

Proton number fluctuation as a signal of the QCD critical end-point

We argue that the event-by-event fluctuation of the proton number is a meaningful and promising observable for the purpose of detecting the QCD critical end-point in heavy-ion collision experiments. The long range fluctuation of the order parameter induces a characteristic correlation between protons which can be measured. The proton fluctuation also manifests itself as anomalous enhancement of charge fluctuations near the end-point, which might be already seen in existing data.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2002

Real-time pion propagation in finite-temperature QCD

We argue that in QCD near the chiral limit, at all temperatures below the chiral phase transition, the dispersion relation of soft pions can be expressed entirely in terms of three temperature-dependent quantities: the pion screening mass, a pion decay constant, and the axial isospin susceptibility. The definitions of these quantities are given in terms of equal-time (static) correlation functions. Thus, all three quantities can be determined directly by lattice methods. The precise meaning of the Gell-Mann--Oakes--Renner relation at finite temperature is given.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2002

Domain walls of relative phase in two-component Bose-Einstein condensates

We consider a system of two interpenetrating Bose-Einstein condensates of atoms in two different hyperfine spin states. We show that in the presence of a small coupling drive between the two spin levels, there exist domain walls across which the relative phase of the two condensates changes by 2pi. We give the physical interpretation of such walls. We show that the wall tension determines the force between certain pairs of vortices at large distances. We also show that the probability of the spontaneous decay of the domain wall is exponentially suppressed, both at finite and at zero temperature, and determine the exponents in the regime of small Rabi frequency. We briefly discuss how such domain walls could be created in future experiments.

cond-mat.soft↗
arXiv2002

Pion Propagation near the QCD Chiral Phase Transition

We point out that, in analogy with spin waves in antiferromagnets, all parameters describing the real-time propagation of soft pions at temperatures below the QCD chiral phase transition can be expressed in terms of static correlators. This allows, in principle, the determination of the soft pion dispersion relation on the lattice. Using scaling and universality arguments, we determine the critical behavior of the parameters of pion propagation. We predict that when the critical temperature is approached from below, the pole mass of the pion drops despite the growth of the pion screening mass. This fact is attributed to the decrease of the pion velocity near the phase transition.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

Kaon Condensation and Goldstone's Theorem

We consider QCD at a nonzero chemical potential for strangeness. At a critical value of the chemical potential equal to the kaon mass, kaon condensation occurs through a continuous phase transition. We show that, when the isospin symmetry is exact in the Lagrangian, a Goldstone boson with a dispersion relation $E \sim p^2$ appears in the kaon condensed phase. At the same time, the number of the Goldstone bosons is less than the number of broken generators. Both phenomena are familiar in non-relativistic systems. We interpret our results in terms of a Goldstone boson counting rule found previously by Nielsen and Chadha. We also formulate a criterion sufficient for the equality between the number of Goldstone bosons and the number of broken generators.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

Asymptotic deconfinement in high-density QCD

We discuss QCD with two light flavors at large baryon chemical potential mu. Color superconductivity leads to partial breaking of the color SU(3) group. We show that the infrared physics is governed by the gluodynamics of the remaining SU(2) group with an exponentially soft confinement scale Lambda_QCD' Delta*exp[-a*mu/(g*Delta)], where Delta<<mu is the superconducting gap, g is the strong coupling, and a=0.81... We estimate that at moderate baryon densities Lambda_QCD' is O(10 MeV) or smaller. The confinement radius increases exponentially with density, leading to "asymptotic deconfinement." The velocity of the SU(2) gluons is small due to the large dielectric constant of the medium.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

Domain walls of high-density QCD

We show that in very dense quark matter there must exist metastable domain walls where the axial U(1) phase of the color-superconducting condensate changes by 2pi. The decay rate of the domain walls is exponentially suppressed and we compute it semiclassically. We give an estimate of the critical chemical potential above which our analysis is under theoretical control.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

Instanton interactions in dense-matter QCD

A Coulomb gas representation of dense-matter QCD is derived from a dual transformation of the low-energy effective Lagrangian. The point-like charges Q=+1,-1 of the gas are identified with the instantons and anti-instantons of such topological charges. An instanton repels another instanton with the same force as it attracts an anti-instanton, in contrast to the semiclassical interaction.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

When can long-range charge fluctuations serve as a QGP signal?

We critically discuss recent suggestion to use long-range modes of charge (electric or baryon) fluctuations as a signal for the presence of Quark-Gluon Plasma at the early stages of a heavy ion collision. We evaluate the rate of diffusion in rapidity for different secondaries, and argue that for conditions of the SPS experiments, it is strong enough to relax the magnitude of those fluctuations almost to its equilibrium values, given by hadronic ``resonance gas''. We further argue that experimental data from SPS agree with this conclusion. We evaluate the detector acceptance needed to measure such ``primordial'' long-range fluctuations at RHIC conditions. We conclude with an application of the charge fluctuation analysis to the search for the QCD critical point.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2001

QCD at finite isospin density

QCD at finite isospin chemical potential mu_I has no fermion sign problem and can be studied on the lattice. We solve this theory analytically in two limits: at low mu_I where chiral perturbation theory is applicable, and at asymptotically high mu_I where perturbative QCD works. At low isospin density the ground state is a pion condensate, whereas at high density it is a Fermi liquid with Cooper pairing. The pairs carry the same quantum numbers as the pion. This leads us to a conjecture that the transition from hadron to quark matter is smooth, which passes several tests. Our results imply a nontrivial phase diagram in the space of temperature and chemical potentials of isospin and baryon number.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2000

QCD-like Theories at Finite Baryon and Isospin Density

We use 2-color QCD as a model to study the effects of simultaneous presence of chemical potentials for isospin charge, $μ_I$, and for baryon number, $μ_B$. We determine the phase diagrams for 2 and 4 flavor theories using the method of effective chiral Lagrangians at low densities and weak coupling perturbation theory at high densities. We determine the values of various condensates and densities as well as the spectrum of excitations as functions of $μ_I$ and $μ_B$. A similar analysis of QCD with quarks in the adjoint representation is also presented. Our results can be of relevance for lattice simulations of these theories. We predict a phase of inhomogeneous condensation (Fulde-Ferrel-Larkin-Ovchinnikov phase) in the 2 colour 2 flavor theory, while we do not expect it the 4 flavor case or in other realizations of QCD with a positive measure.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2000

QCD at finite isospin density: from pion to quark-antiquark condensation

QCD at finite isospin chemical potential mu_I is studied. This theory has no fermion sign problem and can be simulated on the lattice using present-day techniques. We solve this theory analytically in two limits: low mu_I where chiral perturbation theory is applicable, and asymptotically high mu_I where perturbative QCD is at work. At low isospin density the ground state is a superfluid pion condensate. At very high density it is a Fermi liquid with Cooper pairing. The pairs carry the same quantum numbers as the pions. Motivated by this observation, we put forward a conjecture that the transition from hadron to quark matter is smooth. The conjecture passes several nontrivial tests. Our results imply a nontrivial phase diagram in the space of temperature and chemical potentials of isospin and baryon number. At asymtotically large values of mu_I and small values of baryon chemical potential the ground state is in a phase similar to Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov phase. It is characterized by a spatially modulated superfluid order parameter and may be the asymptotic limit of the inhomogeneous pion condensation phase advocated by Migdal and others.

hep-ph↗
arXiv2000

QCD-like Theories at Finite Baryon Density

We study QCD-like theories with pseudoreal fermions at finite baryon density. Such theories include two-color QCD with quarks in the fundamental representation of the color group as well as any-color QCD with quarks in the adjoint color representation. In all such theories the lightest baryons are diquarks. At zero chemical potential $μ$ they are, together with the pseudoscalar mesons, the Goldstone modes of a spontaneously broken enlarged chiral symmetry group. Using symmetry principles, we derive the low-energy effective Lagrangian for these particles. We find that a second order phase transition occurs at a value of $μ$ equal to half the mass of the Goldstone modes. For values of $μ$ beyond this point the scalar diquarks Bose condense and the diquark condensate is nonzero. We calculate the dependence of the chiral condensate, the diquark condensate, the baryon charge density, and the masses of the diquark and pseudoscalar excitations on $μ$ at finite bare quark mass and scalar diquark source. The relevance of our results to lattice QCD calculations and to real three-color QCD at finite baryon density is discussed.

hep-ph↗
arXiv1999

Inverse meson mass ordering in color-flavor-locking phase of high density QCD

We derive the effective Lagrangian for the low-energy massive meson excitations of the color-flavor-locking (CFL) phase of QCD with 3 flavors of light quarks. We compute the decay constants, the maximum velocities, and the masses of the mesons at large baryon chemical potential mu. The decay constants are linear in mu. The meson maximum velocities are close to that of sound. The meson masses in the CFL phase are significantly smaller than in the normal QCD vacuum and depend only on bare quark masses. The order of the meson masses is, to some extent, reversed compared to that in the QCD vacuum. In particular, the lightest particle is eta'.

hep-ph↗
arXiv1999

Random Matrices and the Convergence of Partition Function Zeros in Finite Density QCD

We apply the Glasgow method for lattice QCD at finite chemical potential to a schematic random matrix model (RMM). In this method the zeros of the partition function are obtained by averaging the coefficients of its expansion in powers of the chemical potential. In this paper we investigate the phase structure by means of Glasgow averaging and demonstrate that the method converges to the correct analytically known result. We conclude that the statistics needed for complete convergence grows exponentially with the size of the system, in our case, the dimension of the Dirac matrix. The use of an unquenched ensemble at $μ=0$ does not give an improvement over a quenched ensemble. We elucidate the phenomenon of a faster convergence of certain zeros of the partition function. The imprecision affecting the coefficients of the polynomial in the chemical potential can be interpeted as the appearance of a spurious phase. This phase dominates in the regions where the exact partition function is exponentially small, introducing additional phase boundaries, and hiding part of the true ones. The zeros along the surviving parts of the true boundaries remain unaffected.

hep-lat↗
arXiv1999

On two-color QCD with baryon chemical potential

We study SU(2) color QCD with even number of quark flavors. First, using QCD inequalities we show that at finite baryon chemical potential mu, condensation must occur in the channel with scalar diquark quantum numbers. This breaks the U(1) symmetry generated by baryon charge (baryon superconductivity). Then we derive the effective Lagrangian describing low lying meson and baryon excitations using extended local chiral symmetry of the theory. This enables us to determine the leading term in the dependence of the masses on mu exactly.

hep-ph↗
arXiv1998

Ginzburg Criterion for the Chiral Transition

This report is based on the work done together with J.B. Kogut and C.G. Strouthos. We study a Yukawa theory with spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking and with a large number N of fermions near the finite temperature phase transition. Critical properties in such a system can be described by the mean field theory very close to the transition point. We show that the width of the window of non-trivial scaling is suppressed by a certain power of 1/N. Our Monte Carlo simulations confirm these analytical results. We discuss implications for the chiral phase transition in QCD.

hep-lat↗