A chiral theory of nucleons

Abstract

We present arguments that QCD at low momenta is reduced to a simple theory given by a path integral over pion fields and quarks which obtain dynamical mass owing to chiral symmetry breaking. The dimensional quantities of this low-momenta theory are fixed through the Λ QCD parameter. The effective chiral lagrangian is given by a quark determinant in a background chiral field. Its properties are investigated both for slowly and rapidly varying pion fields. Though it satisfies requirements known from theory and phenomenology, it does not possess non-trivial soliton solutions. However we show that, at large N c , nucleons correspond not to the local minimum of the effective chiral lagrangian but to a minimum of a more subtle quantity. In general, different functionals of the chiral field should be minimized, depending on the baryon charge of the system. We obtain a quantitative picture of nucleons as localized states of “constituent” quarks bound by a self-consistent pion field. Its properties, such as electromagnetic form factors, etc., are investigated in detail. We get very reasonable numerical values for the nucleon static properties.