arXiv subjects

Massimo Mannarelli

Publications and source records attributed to Massimo Mannarelli.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2013

Trapped phonons

We analyze the effect of restricted geometries on the contribution of Nambu-Goldstone bosons (phonons) to the shear viscosity, $η$, of a superfluid. For illustrative purpose we examine a simplified system consisting of a circular boundary of radius $R$, confining a two-dimensional rarefied gas of phonons. Considering the Maxwell-type conditions, we show that phonons that are not in equilibrium with the boundary and that are not specularly reflected exert a shear stress on the boundary. In this case it is possible to define an effective (ballistic) shear viscosity coefficient $η\propto ρ_{\rm ph} χR$, where $ρ_{\rm ph}$ is the density of phonons and $χ$ is a parameter which characterizes the type of scattering at the boundary. For an optically trapped superfluid our results corroborate the findings of Refs. \cite{Mannarelli:2012su, Mannarelli:2012eg}, which imply that at very low temperature the shear viscosity correlates with the size of the optical trap and decreases with decreasing temperature.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2012

Shear viscosity in a superfluid cold Fermi gas at unitarity

We analyze the contributions of Nambu-Goldstone modes to the shear viscosity of a superfluid atomic Fermi gas close to unitarity. We show that the low temperature experimental values of the shear viscosity to entropy ratio, $η/s$, are reproduced considering an effective shear viscosity which takes into account the collisions among Nambu-Goldstone bosons and the finite size of the optical trap. We predict that, for $T \lesssim 0.1 T_F$, $η/s$ should correlate with the size of the trap and linearly decrease with decreasing temperature. For $T \gtrsim 0.1 T_F$, we find agreement with the experimental data assuming that the Nambu-Goldstone modes have an anomalous dispersion law.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Non-Standard Neutrino Propagation and Pion Decay

Motivated by the findings of the OPERA experiment, we discuss the hypothesis that neutrino propagation does not obey Einstein special relativity. Under a minimal set of modifications of the standard model Lagrangian, we consider the implications of non standard neutrino propagation on the description of neutrino interactions and, specifically, on the pion decay processes. We show that all the different dispersion relations which have been proposed so far to explain OPERA results, imply huge departures from the standard expectations. The decay channel $π^+ \to e^+ ν_{\rm e}$ becomes significantly larger than in the standard scenario, and may even dominate over $π^+ \to μ^+ ν_{\rm μ}$. Moreover, the spectral distribution of neutrinos produced in the decay processes and the probability that a pion decays in flight in neutrinos show large deviations from the standard results.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2011

Non-relativistic bound states in a moving thermal bath

We study the propagation of non-relativistic bound states moving at constant velocity across a homogeneous thermal bath and we develop the effective field theory which is relevant in various dynamical regimes. We consider values of the velocity of the bound state ranging from moderate to highly relativistic and temperatures at all relevant scales smaller than the mass of the particles that form the bound state. In particular, we consider two distinct temperature regimes, corresponding to temperatures smaller or higher than the typical momentum transfer in the bound state. For temperatures smaller or of the order of the typical momentum transfer, we restrict our analysis to the simplest system, a hydrogen-like atom. We build the effective theory for this system first considering moderate values of the velocity and then the relativistic case. For large values of the velocity of the bound state, the separation of scales is such that the corresponding effective theory resembles the soft collinear effective theory (SCET). For temperatures larger than the typical momentum transfer we also consider muonic hydrogen propagating in a plasma which contains photons and massless electrons and positrons, so that the system resembles very much heavy quarkonium in a thermal medium of deconfined quarks and gluons. We study the behavior of the real and imaginary part of the static two-body potential, for various velocities of the bound state, in the hard thermal loop approximation. We find that Landau damping ceases to be the relevant mechanism for dissociation from a certain "critical" velocity on in favor of screening. Our results are relevant for understanding how the properties of heavy quarkonia states produced in the initial fusion of partons in the relativistic collision of heavy ions are affected by the presence of an equilibrated quark-gluon plasma.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2011

Collective modes in the color flavor locked phase

We study the low energy effective action for the collective modes of the color flavor locked phase of QCD. This phase of matter has long been known to be a superfluid because by picking a phase its order parameter breaks the quark-number $U(1)_B$ symmetry spontaneously. We consider the modes describing fluctuations in the magnitude of the condensate, namely the Higgs mode, and in the phase of the condensate, namely the Nambu-Goldstone (or Anderson-Bogoliubov) mode associated with the breaking of $U(1)_B$. By employing as microscopic theory the Nambu-Jona Lasinio model, we reproduce known results for the Lagrangian of the Nambu-Goldstone field to the leading order in the chemical potential and extend such results evaluating corrections due to the gap parameter. Moreover, we determine the interaction terms between the Higgs and the Nambu-Goldstone field. This study paves the way for a more reliable study of various dissipative processes in rotating compact stars with a quark matter core in the color flavor locked phase.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2010

Dissipative processes in superfluid neutron stars

We present some results about a novel damping mechanism of r-mode oscillations in neutron stars due to processes that change the number of protons, neutrons and electrons. Deviations from equilibrium of the number densities of the various species lead to the appearance in the Euler equations of the system of a dissipative mechanism, the so-called rocket effect. The evolution of the r-mode oscillations of a rotating neutron star are influenced by the rocket effect and we present estimates of the corresponding damping timescales. In the description of the system we employ a two-fluid model, with one fluid consisting of all the charged components locked together by the electromagnetic interaction, while the second fluid consists of superfluid neutrons. Both components can oscillate however the rocket effect can only efficiently damp the countermoving r-mode oscillations, with the two fluids oscillating out of phase. In our analysis we include the mutual friction dissipative process between the neutron superfluid and the charged component. We neglect the interaction between the two r-mode oscillations as well as effects related with the crust of the star. Moreover, we use a simplified model of neutron star assuming a uniform mass distribution.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2010

Collective modes in asymmetric ultracold Fermi systems

We derive the low energy effective action for the collective modes in systems of fermions interacting via a short-range s-wave attraction, featuring unequal chemical potentials for the two fermionic species (asymmetric systems). As a consequence of the attractive interaction, fermions form a condensate that spontaneously breaks the U(1) symmetry associated with total number conservation. Therefore at sufficiently small temperatures and asymmetries, the system is a superfluid. We reproduce previous results for the stability conditions of the system as a function of the four-fermion coupling and asymmetry. We obtain these results analyzing the coefficients of the low energy effective Lagrangian of the modes describing fluctuations in the magnitude (Higgs mode) and in the phase (Goldstone mode) of the difermion condensate. We find that for certain values of parameters, the mass of the Higgs mode decreases with increasing mismatch between the chemical potentials of the two populations, if we keep the scattering length and the gap parameter constant. Furthermore, we find that the energy cost for creating a position dependent fluctuation of the condensate is constant in the gapped region and increases in the gapless region. These two features may lead to experimentally detectable effects. As an example, we argue that if the superfluid is put in rotation, the square of the radius of the outer core of a vortex should sharply increase on increasing the asymmetry, when we pass through the relevant region in the gapless superfluid phase. Finally, by gauging the global U(1) symmetry, we relate the coefficients of the effective Lagrangian of the Goldstone mode with the screening masses of the gauge field.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2010

Bulk viscosities of a cold relativistic superfluid: color-flavor locked quark matter

We consider the phonon contribution to the bulk viscosities $ζ_1, ζ_2$ and $ζ_3$ of a cold relativistic superfluid. We assume the low temperature $T$ regime and that the transport properties of the system are dominated by the phonons. We use kinetic theory in the relaxation time approximation and the low energy effective field theory of the corresponding system. The parametric dependence of the bulk viscosity coefficients is fixed once the equation of state is specified, and the phonon dispersion law to cubic order in momentum is known. We first present a general discussion, valid for any superfluid, then we focus on the color-flavor locked superfluid because all the parameters needed in the analysis can be computed in the high density limit of QCD, and also because of the possible astrophysical applications. For the three independent bulk viscosity coefficients we find that they scale with the temperature as $ζ_i \sim 1/T$, and that in the conformal limit only the third coefficient $ζ_3$ is non-zero.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Jet energy loss in the quark-gluon plasma by stream instabilities

We study the evolution of the plasma instabilities induced by two jets of particles propagating in opposite directions and crossing a thermally equilibrated non-Abelian plasma. In order to simplify the analysis we assume that the two jets of partons can be described with uniform distribution functions in coordinate space and by Gaussian distribution functions in momentum space. We find that while crossing the quark-gluon plasma, the jets of particles excite unstable chromomagnetic and chromoelectric modes. These fields interact with the particles (or hard modes) of the plasma inducing the production of currents; thus, the energy lost by the jets is absorbed by both the gauge fields and the hard modes of the plasma. We compare the outcome of the numerical simulations with the analytical calculation performed assuming that the jets of particles can be described by a tsunami-like distribution function. We find qualitative and semi-quantitative agreement between the results obtained with the two methods.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Dissipative superfluids, from cold atoms to quark matter

Some results about dissipative processes in superfluids are presented. We focus on fermionic superfluidity and restrict our analysis to the contribution of phonons to bulk viscosity, shear viscosity and thermal conductivity. At sufficiently low temperatures phonons give the dominant contribution to the transport coefficients if all the other low energy excitation of the system are gapped. We first consider a system of cold fermionic atoms close to the unitarity limit. Then we turn to the superfluid phase of quark matter that may be realized at high baryonic density.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Decay widths of charmonia in a hot equilibrated medium

We investigate the properties of charmonia in a thermal medium, showing that with increasing temperature the decay widths of these mesons behave in a non-trivial way. Employing a potential model with interaction potential extracted from thermal lattice QCD calculations of the free-energy of a static quark-antiquark pair, we study some decay processes in the crossover region. We find that at temperatures $T \sim T_c$ the decay widths of the $J/Ψ$ that depend on the value of the wave function at the origin are enhanced with respect to the values in vacuum. In the same temperature range the decay width of the process $χ_{cJ} \to J/Ψ+ γ$ is enhanced by approximately a factor 6 with respect to the value in vacuum. At higher temperatures the charmonia states dissociate and the widths of both decay processes become vanishing small.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Properties of charmonia in a hot equilibrated medium

We investigate the properties of charmonia in a thermal medium, showing that with increasing temperature the decay widths of these mesons behave in a non-trivial way. Our analysis is based on a potential model with interaction potential extracted from thermal lattice QCD calculations of the free-energy of a static quark-antiquark pair. We find that in the crossover region some decay widths are extremely enhanced, which might be interpreted as a signature of the transition from hadronic matter to the deconfined phase. In particular, at temperatures $T\sim T_c$ the decay widths of the $J/Ψ$ that depend on the value of the wave function at the origin are enhanced with respect to the values in vacuum by about a factor 2. In the same temperature range the decay width of the process $χ_{c J} \to J/Ψ+ γ$ is enhanced by approximately a factor 6 with respect to the value in vacuum. At higher temperatures the charmonia states dissociate and the widths of both decay processes become vanishing small.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2009

Bulk viscosities for cold Fermi superfluids close to the unitary limit

We compute the coefficients of bulk viscosity for a non-relativistic superfluid corresponding to a fermionic system close to the unitarity limit. We consider the low temperature regime assuming that the transport properties of the system are dominated by phonons. To compute the coefficients of bulk viscosity we use kinetic theory in the relaxation time approximation and the low energy effective field theory of the corresponding system. We show that the three independent bulk viscosity coefficients, $ζ_1, ζ_2, ζ_3$, associated with irreversible flows vanish for phonons with a linear dispersion law. Considering a phonon dispersion law with a cubic term in momentum we find that in the conformal limit $ζ_1 = ζ_2=0$, while $ζ_3$ is non-zero. Including a conformal breaking term which arises for a large but finite s-wave scattering length, $a$, at the leading order in $1/a$ we obtain that $ζ_1 \propto 1/a$ and $ζ_2 \propto 1/a^2$.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2008

The rigidity of three flavor quark matter

Cold three flavor quark matter at large (but not asymptotically large) densities may exist in a crystalline color superconducting phase. These phases are characterized by a gap parameter $Δ$ that varies periodically in space, forming a crystal structure. A Ginzburg-Landau expansion in $Δ$ shows that two crystal structures based on cubic symmetry are particularly favorable, and may be the ground state of matter at densities present in neutron star cores. We derive the effective action for the phonon fields that describe space- and time-dependent fluctuations of the crystal structure formed by $Δ$, and obtain the shear modulus from the coefficients of the spatial derivative terms. Within a Ginzburg-Landau approximation, we find shear moduli which are 20 to 1000 times larger than those of neutron star crusts. This phase of matter is thus more rigid than any known material in the universe, but at the same time the crystalline color superconducting phase is also superfluid. These properties raise the possibility that the presence of this phase within neutron stars may have distinct implications for their phenomenology. For example, (some) pulsar glitches may originate in crystalline superconducting neutron star cores.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2008

Color superconductivity and dense quark matter

The properties of cold and dense quark matter have been the subject of extensive investigation, especially in the last decade. Unfortunately, we still lack of a complete understanding of the properties of matter in these conditions. One possibility is that quark matter is in a color superconducting phase which is characterized by the formation of a diquark condensate. We review some of the basic concepts of color superconductivity and some of the aspects of this phase of matter which are relevant for compact stars. Since quarks have color, flavor as well as spin degrees of freedom many different color superconducting phases can be realized. At asymptotic densities QCD predicts that the color flavor locked phase is favored. At lower densities where the QCD coupling constant is large, perturbative methods cannot be applied and one has to rely on some effective model, eventually trying to constrain such a model with experimental observations. The picture is complicated by the requirement that matter in the interior of compact stars is in weak equilibrium and neutral. These conditions and the (possible) large value of the strange quark mass conspire to separate the Fermi momenta of quarks with different flavors, rendering homogenous superconducting phases unstable. One of the aims of this presentation is to introduce non-experts in the field to some of the basic ideas of color superconductivity and to some of its open problems.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2008

Mutual friction in a cold color flavor locked superfluid and r-mode instabilities in compact stars

Dissipative processes acting in rotating neutron stars are essential in preventing the growth of the r-mode instability. We estimate the damping time of r-modes of an hypothetical compact quark star made up by color flavor locked quark matter at a temperature $T \lesssim 0.01$ MeV. The dissipation that we consider is due to the the mutual friction force between the normal and the superfluid component arising from the elastic scattering of phonons with quantized vortices. This process is the dominant one for temperatures $T \lesssim 0.01$ MeV where the mean free path of phonons due to their self-interactions is larger than the radius of the star and they can be described as an ideal bosonic gas. We find that r-modes oscillations are efficiently damped by this mechanism for pulsars rotating at frequencies of the order of 1 Hz at most. Our analysis rules out the possibility that cold pulsars rotating at higher frequencies are entirely made up by color flavor locked quark matter.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2008

Jet-induced gauge field instabilities in the quark-gluon plasma

We discuss the properties of the collective modes of a system composed by a thermalized quark-gluon plasma traversed by a relativistic jet of partons. The transport equations obeyed by the components of the plasma and of the jet are studied in the Vlasov approximation. Assuming that the partons in the jet can be described with a tsunami-like distribution function we derive the expressions of the dispersion law of the collective modes. Then the behavior of the unstable gauge modes of the system is analyzed for various values of the velocity of the jet, of the momentum of the collective modes and of the angle between these two quantities. We find that the most unstable modes are those with momentum orthogonal to the velocity of the jet, and the effect is stronger for ultrarelativistic jet velocities. Our results suggest a new possible collective mechanism for the description of the jet quenching phenomena in heavy ion collisions.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2008

Transport theory for cold relativistic superfluids from an analogue model of gravity

We write a covariant transport equation for the phonon excitations of a relativistic superfluid valid at small temperatures. The hydrodynamical equations for this system are derived from the effective field theory associated to the superfluid phonons. We describe how to construct the kinetic theory for the phonon quasiparticles using a relativistic generalization of the analogue model of gravity developed by Unruh. This gravity analogy relies on the equivalence between the action of a phonon field moving in a superfluid background with that of a boson propagating in a given curved space-time. Exploiting this analogy we obtain continuity equations for the phonon current, entropy and energy-momentum tensor in a covariant form, valid in any reference frame. Our aim is to shed light on some aspects of transport phenomena of relativistic superfluidity. In particular, we are interested in the low temperature regime of the color flavor locked phase, which is a color superconducting and superfluid phase of high density QCD that may be realized in the core of neutron stars.

hep-ph↗