arXiv subjects

Sheng-Tai Li

Publications and source records attributed to Sheng-Tai Li.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

QCD in strong magnetic fields: fluctuations of conserved charges and equation of state

We present continuum-estimated (2+1)-flavor lattice QCD results for second-order fluctuations of conserved charges and the leading-order equation of state in the presence of strong magnetic fields at nonzero baryon chemical potential, using the HISQ action at the physical pion mass. The baryon-electric charge correlation $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ exhibits striking sensitivity to the magnetic field: $R_{cp}$-like double ratios $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}/\chi^{\rm Q}_{2}$ and $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}/\chi^{\rm QS}_{11}$ reach enhancements of $\sim2$ and $\sim2.25$ at $eB \simeq 8M_\pi^2$ along the transition line, establishing $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ as a magnetometer of QCD. To bridge theoretical predictions and experimental observations, we construct HRG-based proxy observables and apply systematic kinematic cuts emulating STAR and ALICE detector acceptances, which retain $\sim80\%$ of the lattice QCD magnetic sensitivity. Extending to the QCD equation of state under strangeness neutrality and isospin asymmetry, we determine the chemical potential ratio $q_1\equiv(\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B})_{\rm LO}$ and the pressure coefficient $P_2$ for magnetic field strengths up to $eB \simeq 0.8~{\rm GeV}^2 \sim 45 M_{\pi}^2$. The results reveal temperature-band crossings, hierarchy reversals, and non-monotonic structures driven by the nontrivial interplay between thermal and magnetic effects.

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arXiv2025

QCD in strong magnetic fields: fluctuations of conserved charges and EoS

Strong magnetic fields can profoundly affect the equilibrium properties, characterized by the equation of state and bulk thermodynamics of strongly interacting matter. Although such fields are expected in off-central heavy-ion collisions, directly measuring their experimental imprints remains extremely challenging. To address this, we propose the baryon-electric charge correlations $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ and the chemical potential ratio $\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B}$ as magnetic-field-sensitive probes, based on (2+1)-flavor QCD lattice simulations at physical pion masses. Along the transition line, $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ and $(\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B})_{\rm LO}$ in Pb-Pb collisions increase by factors of 2.1 and 2.4 at $eB \simeq 8M_\pi^2$, respectively. To bridge theoretical predictions and experimental observations, we construct HRG-based proxies and apply systematic kinematic cuts to emulate STAR and ALICE detector acceptances. Furthermore, we extend this investigation to the QCD equation of state, and examine the leading-order thermodynamic coefficients for strangeness-neutral scenarios up to $eB \simeq 0.8 {\rm GeV}^2 \sim 45 m_{\pi}^2$, revealing intriguing non-monotonic structures.

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arXiv2025

Baryon Electric Charge Correlation as QCD Magnetometer

The detection of strong magnetic fields in peripheral heavy-ion collisions is crucial for observing effects such as the chiral magnetic effect but has proven exceptionally difficult. To address this, we propose the baryon electric charge correlation $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ and the chemical potential ratio $\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B}$ as sensitive probes of magnetic fields, based on (2+1)-flavor lattice QCD simulations at the physical pion mass. Along the transition line, $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ and $(\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B})_{\rm LO}$ in Pb-Pb collisions increase by factors of 2.1 and 2.4 at $eB \simeq 8M_\pi^2$, respectively. To bridge theoretical predictions with experimental observables, we implement systematic kinematic cuts that emulate detector acceptances of the STAR and ALICE experiments within the hadron resonance gas model. This allows us to construct experimentally relevant proxy observables. Furthermore, we demonstrate that $(\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B})_{\rm LO}$ is also sensitive to the collision system, showing a $1.5$-fold increase from Zr-Zr to Ru-Ru isobar collisions. Our findings offer new insights into thermo-magnetic effects and provide experimentally relevant guidance for the detection of magnetic fields in heavy-ion collisions.

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arXiv2025

Leading-Order QCD Equation of State in Strong Magnetic Fields at Nonzero Baryon Chemical Potential

We present continuum-estimated $(2+1)$-flavor lattice QCD results for the leading-order Taylor expansion coefficients of the equation of state in strong magnetic fields and at nonzero baryon chemical potential. Simulations employ the highly improved staggered quark (HISQ) action with physical pion masses on lattices of temporal extent $N_\tau = 8,\,12$, covering $145 \lesssim T \lesssim 165~\mathrm{MeV}$ and $eB \lesssim 0.8~\mathrm{GeV}^2$, imposing strangeness neutrality with baseline results at electric charge to baryon number ratio $r = 0.4$. We determine the $T$--$eB$ dependence of $q_1$ and $s_1$ (electric charge and strangeness chemical potential ratios), pressure coefficient $P_2$, baryon number density coefficient $N_1^{\rm B}$, and energy-like coefficients $\Theta_2$ (trace anomaly), $\epsilon_2$ (energy density), and $\sigma_2$ (entropy density). Magnetic fields induce temperature-band crossings for $q_1$ and $P_2$ and non-monotonic structures in the energy-like coefficients, with $\Theta_2$ at strong fields possibly vanishing or turning negative at higher $T$, indicating dominance of the pressure term over the energy contribution. We also examine the $r$-dependence, finding that $r=0$ (charge-neutral matter) shows the most muted magnetic-field enhancement of $P_2$ despite larger $|q_1|$, providing a useful reference for neutron-star-like conditions. Comparisons with the hadron resonance gas (HRG) model show qualitative agreement at low $T$ and weak $eB$, with clear deviations near the crossover and at strong fields. These results provide useful input for constraining models and effective theories of QCD matter in strong magnetic fields at finite baryon density.

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arXiv2025

Second order fluctuations of conserved charges in external magnetic fields

We present a first-principles lattice QCD investigation of second-order fluctuations of and correlations among conserved charges -- baryon number (B), electric charge (Q), and strangeness (S) -- in the presence of external magnetic fields. Our study employs lattice simulations of (2+1)-flavor QCD with physical pion masses using highly improved staggered fermions (HISQ) on $48^3 \times 12$ and $32^3 \times 8$ lattices, covering a wide range of magnetic field strengths up to $eB \simeq 0.8$ GeV$ ^2$. We identify clear signals of magnetic field-induced modifications to these fluctuations and correlations, with the baryon-electric charge correlation, $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$, exhibiting particularly strong sensitivity to the magnetic field. To bridge theoretical predictions with experimental observables, we implement systematic kinematic cuts that emulate detector acceptances of the STAR and ALICE experiments within the hadron resonance gas (HRG) model and construct proxy observables for fluctuations measurable in heavy-ion collision experiments. Our findings highlight $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ as a promising ``magnetometer" for probing the presence of magnetic fields in QCD matter. Furthermore, we explore experimentally relevant ratios involving $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$, demonstrating their potential in mitigating volume effects and enhancing sensitivity to magnetic fields in collision environments. Additionally, we assess the limitations of the HRG model at strong magnetic fields, revealing deviations that indicate nontrivial modifications to hadronic degrees of freedom. These results offer new insights into the interplay between thermal and magnetic effects in the QCD phase diagram and provide experimentally relevant guidance for the detection of magnetic fields in heavy-ion collisions.

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arXiv2025

Baryon-Electric Charge Correlations and Chemical Potentials as Probes of Magnetized QCD

We present the first lattice QCD results of quadratic fluctuations and correlations of conserved charges in (2+1)-flavor lattice QCD in the presence of a background magnetic field. The simulations were performed using the Highly Improved Staggered Quarks with physical pion mass $m_\pi$ = 135 MeV on $N_\tau=8$ and 12 lattices. We find that the correlation between net baryon number and electric charge, denoted as $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11} $, can serve as a magnetometer of QCD. At pseudocritical temperatures ($T_{pc}$) the $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ starts to increase rapidly with magnetic field strength $eB \gtrsim 2M^2_{\pi}$ and by a factor 2 at $eB\simeq 8 M^2_{\pi}$. By comparing with the hadron resonance gas model, we find that the $eB$ dependence of $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ is mainly due to the doubly charged $\Delta$(1232) baryon. Although the doubly charged $\Delta$(1232) could not be detected experimentally, its decay products, protons and pions, retain the $eB$ dependence of $\Delta$(1232)'s contribution to $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$. Furthermore, the ratio of electric charge chemical potential to baryon chemical potential, $\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B}$, shows significant dependence on the magnetic field strength and varies with the ratio of electric charge to baryon number in the colliding nuclei in heavy ion collisions. These results provide baselines for effective theory and model studies, and both $\chi^{\rm BQ}_{11}$ and $\mu_{\rm Q}/\mu_{\rm B}$ could be useful probes for the detection of magnetic fields in relativistic heavy ion collision experiments as compared with corresponding results from the hadron resonance gas model.

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arXiv2025

QCD Equation of State with Strong Magnetic Fields and Nonzero Baryon Density

In this work, we have carried out lattice simulations of $(2+1)$-flavor QCD using highly improved staggered quarks at the physical pion mass on $32^3 \times 8$ and $48^3 \times 12$ lattices, with magnetic field strengths ranging up to 0.8 GeV$^2$ and nonzero baryon chemical potentials employing the Taylor expansion framework. We present lattice QCD continuum estimate results, along with the magnetized hadron resonance and ideal gas comparisons, for the leading-order Taylor expansion coefficients for bulk thermodynamic quantities such as pressure, number density, energy density, and entropy density, focusing on the significant impact of strong magnetic fields.

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arXiv2025

Chiral condensates and screening masses of neutral pseudoscalar mesons from lattice QCD at physical quark masses

We investigate the effects of temperature $T$ and external magnetic fields $eB$ on the chiral condensates and screening masses of neutral pseudoscalar mesons, including $\pi^0$, $K^0$, and $\eta_{s\bar{s}}^0$, in (2+1)-flavor lattice QCD with physical quark masses. The chiral condensates are intrinsically connected to the screening masses via Ward-Takahashi identities, with the latter characterizing the inverse of the spatial correlation length in the pseudoscalar channel. Using highly improved staggered quarks, we perform simulations on lattices with temporal extents $N_\tau = 8, 12, 16$ and an aspect ratio of 4, covering five temperatures from 145 MeV to 166 MeV. For each temperature, eight magnetic field strengths are simulated, reaching up to $eB \sim 0.8$ GeV$^2$. These simulations allow us to provide continuum estimates for the chiral condensates and screening masses. We observe intricate behavior in the light ($ud$), strange-light ($ds$) and strange ($s$) quark condensates as functions of the magnetic field and temperature, reflecting the competition between magnetic catalysis and inverse magnetic catalysis effects. This complex behavior is also mirrored in the screening masses of the neutral pseudoscalar mesons. Notably, the screening masses of $\pi^0$ and $K^0$ exhibit a non-monotonic dependence on $eB$, closely following the variations in their corresponding chiral condensates. Meanwhile, the screening mass of $\eta_{s\bar{s}}^0$ decreases monotonically with increasing $eB$. These findings provide valuable insights for understanding the behavior of QCD in a thermomagnetic medium and can serve as benchmarks for low-energy QCD models and effective theories.

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arXiv2024

Baryon electric charge correlation as a magnetometer of QCD

The correlation between net baryon number and electric charge, $χ_{11}^{\rm BQ}$, can serve as a magnetometer of QCD. This is demonstrated by lattice QCD computations using the highly improved staggered quarks with physical pion mass of $M_π=135~$MeV on $N_τ=8$ and 12 lattices. We find that $χ_{11}^{\rm BQ}$ along the transition line starts to increase rapidly with magnetic field strength $eB\gtrsim 2M_π^2$ and by a factor 2 at $eB\simeq 8M_π^2$. Furthermore, the ratio of electric charge chemical potential to baryon chemical potential, $μ_{\rm Q}/μ_{\rm B}$, shows significant dependence on the magnetic field strength and varies from the ratio of electric charge to baryon number in the colliding nuclei in heavy ion collisions. These results can provide baselines for effective theory and model studies, and both $χ_{11}^{\rm BQ}$ and $μ_{\rm Q}/μ_{\rm B}$ could be useful probes for the detection of magnetic fields in relativistic heavy ion collision experiments as compared with corresponding results from the hadron resonance gas model.

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arXiv2022

Fluctuations of conserved charges in strong magnetic fields from lattice QCD

We present the first lattice QCD results of the second order fluctuations of and correlations among net baryon number, electric charge and strangeness in (2+1)-flavor lattice QCD in the presence of a background magnetic field with physical pion mass $m_π=135$ MeV. To mimic the magnetic field strength produced in the early stage of heavy-ion collision experiments we use 6 different values of the magnetic field strength up to $ \sim $10$m_π^2$. We find that the correlations between baryon number and electric charge along the transition line are substantially affected by magnetic fields in the current $eB$ window, which could be useful for probing the existence of a magnetic field in heavy-ion collision experiments.

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arXiv2021

Critical behavior towards the chiral limit at vanishing and non-vanishing chemical potentials

We study the scaling behavior of the (2+1)-flavor QCD crossover region towards the chiral limit with smaller-than-physical light quark mass gauge ensembles, generated using the HISQ fermion discretization. At zero chemical potential, we study the fluctuations of conserved charges and their correlations with the chiral condensate, towards the chiral limit. We analyse the role of universal and regular contributions to the above quantities. We find a preliminary estimate of the leading curvature coefficient of the chiral phase transition line using scaling arguments.

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arXiv2021

Correlated Dirac Eigenvalues and Axial Anomaly in Chiral Symmetric QCD

We investigate the Dirac eigenvalue spectrum ($ρ(λ,m_l)$) to study the microscopic origin of axial anomaly in high temperature phase of QCD. We propose novel relations between the derivatives ($\partial^n ρ(λ,m_l)/\partial m_l^n$) of the Dirac eigenvalue spectrum with respect to the quark mass ($m_l$) and the $(n+1)$-point correlations among the eigenvalues ($λ$) of the massless Dirac operator. Based on these relations, we present lattice QCD results for $\partial^n ρ(λ,m_l)/\partial m_l^n$ ($n=1, 2, 3$) with $m_l$ corresponding to pion masses $m_π=160-55$ MeV, and at a temperature of about 1.6 times the chiral phase transition temperature. Calculations were carried out using (2+1)-flavors of highly improved staggered quarks and the tree-level Symanzik gauge action with the physical strange quark mass, three lattice spacings $a=0.12, 0.08, 0.06$ fm, and lattices having aspect ratios $4-9$. We find that $ρ(λ\to0,m_l)$ develops a peaked structure. This peaked structure, which arises due to non-Poisson correlations within the infrared part of the Dirac eigenvalue spectrum, becomes sharper as $a\to0$, and its amplitude is proportional to $m_l^2$. After continuum and chiral extrapolations, we find that the axial anomaly remains manifested in two-point correlation functions of scalar and pseudo-scalar mesons in the chiral limit. We demonstrate that the behavior of $ρ(λ\to0,m_l)$ is responsible for it.

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arXiv2020

Dirac Eigenvalue spectrum of $N_f$=2+1 QCD towards the chiral limit using HISQ fermions

We utilize the eigenvalue filtering technique combined with the stochastic estimate of the mode number to determine the eigenvalue spectrum. Simulations of (2 + 1)-flavor QCD are performed using the Highly Improved Staggered Quarks (HISQ/tree) action on $N_τ$ = 8 lattices with aspect ratios $N_σ/N_τ$ ranging from 5 to 7. The strange quark mass is fixed to its physical value $m_{s}^{\rm phy}$, and the light quark masses $m_{l}$ are varied from $m_{s}^{\rm phy}/40$ to $m_{s}^{\rm phy}/160$ which correspond to pion mass $m_π$ ranging from 110 MeV to 55 MeV in the continuum limit. We compute the chiral condensate and $χ_π - χ_δ$ through the eigenvalue spectrum obtained from the the eigenvalue filtering method. We compare these results with those obtained from a direct calculation of the observables which involves inversions of the fermion matrix using the stochastic "noise vector" method. We find that these approaches yield consistent results. Furthermore, we also investigate the quark mass and temperature dependences of the Dirac eigenvalue density at zero eigenvalues to gain more insights about the $U_A(1)$ symmetry breaking in QCD.

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arXiv2020

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.

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arXiv2019

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.

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arXiv2017

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.

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