Pion Condensation Research Articles

Dual symmetries of dense three- and two-color QCD and some QCD-like NJL models

In this paper, the symmetry properties of the phase diagram of dense quark matter composed of u and d quarks with two or three colors has been investigated in the framework of massless (3+1)-dimensional Nambu–Jona-Lasinio (NJL) and QCD models. It turns out that in the presence of baryon μB, isospin μI, chiral μ5, and chiral isospin μI5 chemical potentials the Lagrangians of these models are invariant under the so-called dual transformations. Consequently, the entire NJL model (or QCD) thermodynamic potentials are dually symmetric. In particular, it means that in the total (μB,μI,μ5,μI5)-phase portraits of these models the chiral symmetry-breaking (CSB) and charged pion condensation (PC) phases are arranged dually conjugated (or symmetrical) to each other (in the case of three-color models), whereas in the case of two-color quark matter, these models predict the entire phase structure in which there are dual symmetries between CSB, charged PC, and baryon superfluid phases. Published by the American Physical Society 2025

Charged pion condensation and color superconductivity phenomena in chirally asymmetric dense quark matter

Charged pion condensation and color superconductivity phenomena in chirally asymmetric dense quark matter

Thermal pion condensation: holography meets lattice QCD

The holographic Witten-Sakai-Sugimoto model is often employed to describe strongly-coupled baryonic and isospin-asymmetric matter, for example in the context of neutron stars. Here we consider the case of vanishing baryon chemical potential, where detailed comparisons to data from lattice QCD are possible. To this end, we extend previous works by including a realistic pion mass and pion condensation into the decompactified limit of the model and evaluate the system for arbitrary isospin chemical potentials and temperatures. After suitably fixing the 3 parameters of the model, we find that the overall phase structure is in excellent agreement with lattice results. This also holds for observables at low temperatures in the strongly coupled regime, while we discover and discuss some discrepancies at large temperatures. Our findings give reassurance for the validity of previous and future applications of this model and highlight the aspects where improvements are needed.

Thermal effects on sound velocity peak and conformality in isospin QCD

We study thermal effects on equations of state (EOS) in isospin QCD, utilizing a quark-meson model coupled to a Polyakov loop. The quark-meson model is analyzed at one-loop that is the minimal order to include quark substructure constraints on pions which condense at finite isospin density. In the previous study we showed that the quark-meson model at zero temperature produces the sound velocity peak and the negative trace anomaly in the domain between the chiral effective theory regime at low density and the perturbative QCD regime at high density, in reasonable agreement with lattice simulations. We now include thermal effects from quarks in the Polyakov loop background and examine EOS, especially the sound velocity and trace anomaly along isentropic trajectories. At large isospin density, there are three temperature windows; (i) the pion condensed region with almost vanishing Polyakov loops, (ii) the pion condensed region with finite Polyakov loops, and (iii) the quark gas without pion condensates. In the domain (i), the gap associated with the pion condensate strongly quenches thermal excitations. As the system approaches the domain (ii), thermal quarks, which behave as nonrelativistic particles, add energy density but little pressure, substantially reducing the sound velocity to the value less than the conformal value while increasing the trace anomaly toward the positive value. Approaching the domain (iii), thermal quarks become more relativistic as pion condensates melt, increasing sound velocity toward the conformal limit. Corrections from thermal pions are also briefly discussed. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Baryonic vortex phase and magnetic field generation in QCD with isospin and baryon chemical potentials

We propose a novel baryonic vortex phase in low energy dense QCD with finite baryon and isospin chemical potentials. It is known that the homogeneous charged pion condensate emerges as a ground state at finite isospin chemical potential, and therein arises the Abrikosov vortex lattice with an applied magnetic field. We first demonstrate that a vortex with the same quantized magnetic flux as the conventional Abrikosov vortex, carries a baryon number captured by the third homotopy group of Skyrmions, once we take into account a modulation of the neutral pion inside the vortex core. Such a vortex-Skyrmion state is therefore dubbed the baryonic vortex. We further reveal that when the baryon chemical potential is above a critical value, the baryonic vortex has negative tension measured from the charged pion condensation. It implies that the phase, in which such vortices emerge spontaneously without an external magnetic field, would take over the ground state at high baryon density. Such a new phase contributes to the comprehension of QCD phase diagram and relates to the generation of magnetic fields inside neutron stars.

Cold isospin asymmetric baryonic rich matter in nonlocal NJL-like models

We study the features of low energy strong interactions for a system at zero temperature and finite baryon and isospin chemical potentials, in the framework of a Nambu–Jona-Lasinio-like model that includes nonlocal four-point interactions. We analyze the phase transitions corresponding to chiral symmetry restoration and pion condensation, comparing our results with those obtained from local NJL-like models and lattice QCD calculations. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Sound velocity peak and conformality in isospin QCD

We study zero temperature equations of state (EOS) in isospin QCD within a quark-meson model which is renormalizable and hence eliminates high density artifacts in models with the ultraviolet cutoff (e.g., Nambu-Jona-Lasinio type models models). The model exhibits a crossover transition of pion condensations from the Bose-Einstein-Condensation regime at low density to the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer regime at high density. The EOS stiffens quickly and approaches the quark matter regime at density significantly less than the density for pions to spatially overlap. The squared sound velocity cs2 develops a peak in the crossover region, and then gradually relaxes to the conformal value 1/3 from above, in contrast to the perturbative QCD results which predicts the approach from below. In the context of QCD computations, this opposite trend is in part due to the lack of gluon exchanges in our model, and also due to the nonperturbative power corrections arising from the condensates. We argue that with large power corrections the trace anomaly can be negative. Our EOS reproduces the qualitative trend of the lattice results from the BEC to the BCS regime, implying that the quark-meson model captures relevant effective degrees of freedom. The BCS gap in our model is Δ≃300 MeV in the quark matter domain, and naive application of the BCS relation for the critical temperature Tc≃0.57Δ yields the estimate Tc≃170 MeV, in good agreement with the lattice data. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Quantum vortex phases of charged pion condensates induced by rotation in a magnetic field

Using the relativistic complex scalar field model with a repulsive self-interaction, we discuss the ground state structure of charged pion condensation under the coexistence of parallel rotation and magnetic field. Our previous study found that the density distribution profile of the condensates is a supergiant quantum vortex phase and change with rotational speed and coupling constant. In this work, we further discover vortex lattice structures in the condensates under conditions of small rotation and strong coupling constant. This mechanism can be thought of as electrical superconductivity: Vortex lattices are created to better adapt to changes in rotation and interaction. Furthermore, large rotation and weak coupling constant are more likely to cause the vortex lattices to be destroyed and form a giant quantum vortex similar to a doughnut. We expect this phenomenon can be observed in the relativistic noncentral heavy ion collisions with large rotation and strong magnetic field. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Can rooted staggered fermions describe nonzero baryon density at low temperatures?

Research on the quantum chromodynamics (QCD) phase diagram with lattice field theory methods is dominated by the use of rooted staggered fermions, as they are the computationally cheapest discretization available. We show that rooted staggered fermions at a nonzero baryochemical potential μB predict a sharp rise in the baryon density at low temperatures and μB≳3mπ/2, where mπ is the Goldstone pion mass. We elucidate the nature of the nonanalyticity behind this sharp rise in the density by a comparison of reweighting results with a Taylor expansion of high order. While at first sight this nonanalytic behavior becomes apparent at the same position where the pion condensation transition takes place in the phase-quenched theory, the nature of the nonanalyticity in the two theories appears to be quite different: While at nonzero isospin density the data are consistent with a genuine thermodynamic (branch-point) singularity, the results at nonzero baryon density point to an essential singularity at μB=0. The effect is absent for four flavors of degenerate quarks, where rooting is not used. For the two-flavor case, we show numerical evidence that the magnitude of the effect diminishes on finer lattices. We discuss the implications of this technical complication on future studies of the QCD phase diagram. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Non-Abelian chiral soliton lattice in rotating QCD matter: Nambu-Goldstone and excited modes

The ground state of QCD with two flavors at a finite baryon chemical potential under rapid rotation is a chiral soliton lattice (CSL) of the η meson, consisting of a stack of sine-Gordon solitons carrying a baryon number, due to the anomalous coupling of the η meson to the rotation. In a large parameter region, the ground state becomes a non-Abelian CSL, in which due to the neutral pion condensation each η soliton decays into a pair of non-Abelian sine-Gordon solitons carrying S2 moduli originated from Nambu-Goldstone (NG) modes localized around it, corresponding to the spontaneously broken vector symmetry SU(2)V. There, the S2 modes of neighboring solitons are anti-aligned, and these modes should propagate in the transverse direction of the lattice due to the interaction between the S2 modes of neighboring solitons. In this paper, we calculate excitations including gapless NG modes and excited modes around non-Abelian and Abelian (η) CSLs, and find three gapless NG modes with linear dispersion relations (type-A NG modes): two isospinons (S2 modes) and a phonon corresponding to the spontaneously broken vector SU(2)V and translational symmetries around the non-Abelian CSL, respectively, and only a phonon for the Abelian CSL because of the recovering SU(2)V. We also find in the deconfined phase that the dispersion relation of the isospinons becomes of the Dirac type, i.e. linear even at large momentum.

Chiral Soliton Lattice turns into 3D crystal

Chiral perturbation theory predicts the chiral anomaly to induce a so-called Chiral Soliton Lattice at sufficiently large magnetic fields and baryon chemical potentials. This state breaks translational invariance in the direction of the magnetic field and was shown to be unstable with respect to charged pion condensation. Improving on previous work by considering a realistic pion mass, we employ methods from type-II superconductivity and construct a three-dimensional pion (and baryon) crystal perturbatively, close to the instability curve of the Chiral Soliton Lattice. We find an analogue of the usual type-I/type-II transition in superconductivity: along the instability curve for magnetic fields eB > 0.12 GeV2 and chemical potentials μ < 910 MeV, this crystal can continuously supersede the Chiral Soliton Lattice. For smaller magnetic fields the instability curve must be preceded by a discontinuous transition.

Phases of cold holographic QCD: Baryons, pions and rho mesons

We improve the holographic description of isospin-asymmetric baryonic matter within the Witten-Sakai-Sugimoto model by accounting for a realistic pion mass, computing the pion condensate dynamically, and including rho meson condensation by allowing the gauge field in the bulk to be anisotropic. This description takes into account the coexistence of baryonic matter with pion and rho meson condensates. Our main result is the zero-temperature phase diagram in the plane of baryon and isospin chemical potentials. We find that the effective pion mass in the baryonic medium increases with baryon density and that, as a consequence, there is no pion condensation in neutron-star matter. Our improved description also predicts that baryons are disfavored at low baryon chemical potentials even for arbitrarily large isospin chemical potential. Instead, rho meson condensation sets in on top of the pion condensate at an isospin chemical potential of about 9.4\, m_\pi9.4mπ. We further observe a highly non-monotonic phase boundary regarding the disappearance of pion condensation.

First-order QCD transition in a primordial magnetic field

Recalling the expectation of an extremely strong primordial magnetic field $H$, we recheck transitions among the phases of chiral symmetry restoration ($\chi SR$), chiral symmetry breaking ($\chi SB$), and pion superfluidity ($\pi SF$)in the QCD epoch of the early Universe. For homogeneous phases in a finite $H$, a sensible scheme is adopted to determine the phase boundaries of $\pi SF$, which is also superconductivity phase itself. In the first part, the QCD phase diagrams are studied in detail within the chiral effective Polyakov-Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model and the transitions involving $\pi SF$ are found to be of first order at relatively small $H$. As expected from the Meissner effect, the regime of $\pi SF$ shrinks with increasing $H$ and completely vanishes beyond a threshold value. In the second part, the bubble dynamics is illuminated for the stronger first-order transition, $\chi SR\rightarrow\pi SF$, in the more convenient Polyakov-quark-meson model. The coupled equations of motion of pion condensate and magnetic field are solved consistently to give the bubble structure. Then, based on bubble collisions, we explore gravitational wave (GW) emission by developing a simple toy model in advance; and the characteristic frequency of the relic GW is estimated to be of the order $0.1-1\,{\rm K}$ or $10^9-10^{10}\,{\rm Hz}$ in our galaxy.

Effective Lagrangian at nonzero isospin chemical potential

We revisit the most general effective Lagrangian within chiral perturbation theory at nonzero isospin chemical potential ${\ensuremath{\mu}}_{I}$ up to $\mathcal{O}({p}^{4})$. In addition to the contributions already considered in the literature, we discuss the effects of new terms allowed by the symmetries derived within the external source method including spurion fields, as well as linear-field corrections relevant to $\mathcal{O}({p}^{4})$. We study the influence of those new contributions to the free energy density at zero temperature and observables derived from it, such as the pion and quark condensates and the isospin density. Corrections are shown to be compatible with lattice results, which favor nonzero values for the low-energy constants (LECs) multiplying the new $\mathcal{O}({p}^{2})$ and $\mathcal{O}({p}^{4})$ field operators in the Lagrangian. In particular, the $\mathcal{O}({p}^{4})$ LECs are renormalized to render the free energy density finite. Constraints on the LECs arise from preserving the physical condition ${n}_{I}({\ensuremath{\mu}}_{I}&lt;{\ensuremath{\mu}}_{c})=0$, while ${\ensuremath{\mu}}_{c}={M}_{\ensuremath{\pi}}$ still holds to leading order and can be maintained to next-to-leading order through an additional constraint requiring the new LECs.

Chiral anomaly induces superconducting baryon crystal

It was previously shown within chiral perturbation theory that the ground state of QCD in a sufficiently large magnetic field and at nonvanishing, but not too large, baryon chemical potential is a so-called chiral soliton lattice. The crucial ingredient of this observation was the chiral anomaly in the form of a Wess-Zumino-Witten term, which couples the baryon chemical potential to the magnetic field and the gradient of the neutral pion field. It was also shown that the chiral soliton lattice becomes unstable towards charged pion condensation at larger magnetic fields. We point out that this instability bears a striking resemblance to the second critical magnetic field of a type-II superconductor, however with the superconducting phase appearing upon increasing the magnetic field. The resulting phase has a periodically varying charged pion condensate that coexists with a neutral pion supercurrent. We construct this phase analytically in the chiral limit and show that it is energetically preferred. Just like an ordinary type-II superconductor, it exhibits a hexagonal array of magnetic flux tubes, and, due to the chiral anomaly, a spatially oscillating baryon number of the same crystalline structure.

Phases of rotating baryonic matter: non-Abelian chiral soliton lattices, antiferro-isospin chains, and ferri/ferromagnetic magnetization

A chiral soliton lattice (CSL), proposed as the ground state of rotating baryonic matter at a finite density, is shown to be unstable in a large parameter region for two flavors owing to pion condensations, leading to two types of non-Abelian (NA) CSL phases (dimer and deconfining phases). We determine the phase diagram where the dimer phase meets the other phases and QCD vacuum at three tricritical points. The critical angular velocity of NA-CSLs is lower than that of η-CSL. Each NA soliton carries an isospin, and an antiferro-isospin chain is formed leading to gapless isospinons. The anomalous coupling to the magnetic field makes the NA-CSL (η-CSL) ferrimagnetic (ferromagnetic).

Influence of chiral chemical potential μ5 on phase structure of the two-color quark matter

In this paper the influence of chiral chemical potential $\mu_5$ on the phenomenon of diquark condensation and phase structure of dense quark matter altogether is contemplated in the framework of effective two-color and two-flavor Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model. We show that the duality relations, found $\mu_5=0$, are also valid for any value of $\mu_5\neq0$. Hence the dualities seem to be a real fundamental feature of the phase diagram of two color quark matter, and besides they are a very powerful tool of studying the phase structure. In terms of dualities and the influence on the phase diagram chiral imbalance $\mu_5$ stands alone from other chemical potentials. Two regimes in the phase diagram could be discerned, the first one, rather small or moderate values of chemical potentials $\mu_B$, $\mu_I$ and $\mu_{I5}$, where the picture is rather concise and elegant: each of the above phenomena is in one-to-one correspondence with some chemical potential ($\mu_{I5}$ induces chiral symmetry breaking, $\mu_I$ propels charged pion condensation and $\mu_B$ leads to diquark condensation). In this regime chiral chemical potential $\mu_5$ does not break this correspondence, it has a property of being universal catalyzer, i.e. it {\it catalyzes/enhances} all the phenomena on equal footing. The feature of chiral imbalance $\mu_5$ to catalyze chiral symmetry breaking phenomenon was known before but its catalytic properties appeared to be more universal and it can catalyze also diquark and charged pion condensation. These happen due to the dual properties. In the second regime, when several chemical potentials reach rather large values, one could observe a rather complicated and rich phase structure, and $\mu_5$ can be a factor that not so much catalyzes as {\it triggers} rather peculiar phases. For example, it can lead to the formation of diquark condensation at zero baryon chemical potential.

S -wave pion condensation in symmetric nuclear matter

S-wave pion-nucleon interactions in the linear sigma model, and in Manohar-Georgi and Gasser-Sainio-Svarc models with finite number of terms in Lagrangians, as well as in a general phenomenological approach are reviewed. Subtleties associated with the current algebra theorems and field redefinitions are discussed. In the first and third models most likely the s-wave pion condensation in the isospin-symmetric matter does not occur at least up to high densities, whereas within the second model it may appear already at moderate densities. In the phenomenological approach two parameterizations of the s-wave pion-nucleon scattering amplitude and the pion polarization operator used in the literature are considered. The first parameterization employs the off-mass-shell amplitude and allows to fulfil the current algebra theorems. Using it the s-wave pion polarization operator in the isospin-symmetric matter is reconstructed within the gas approximation. With this pion polarization operator the s-wave pion condensation in the isospin-symmetric matter does not occur at least up to high densities. Second parameterization uses the on-mass-shell pion-nucleon scattering amplitude and does not satisfy the Adler and Weinberg conditions. With such a parameterization most likely the s-wave pion condensation in the isospin-symmetric matter may occur already at the nucleon density $n\simeq (1.4-2.5) n_0$, where $n_0$ is the density of the atomic nucleus, that should result in observable effects. Both parameterizations allow to successfully describe the pion atom data.

The Phase Structure of Two Color QCD and Charged Pion Condensation Phenomenon

The phase structure of dense quark matter in the two color case has been investigated with nonzero baryon $${{\mu }_{{\text{B}}}}$$ , isospin $${{\mu }_{{\text{I}}}}$$ and chiral isospin $${{\mu }_{{{\text{I5}}}}}$$ chemical potentials. It has been shown in the mean-field approximation that there exist three dualities, one of them between phases with spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking and condensation of charged pions, found in the three color case. The other two dual symmetries between the phase with condensation of charged pions and the phase with diquark condensation and between chiral symmetry breaking and diquark condensation phenomena. It has been demonstrated that due to the duality properties the phase diagram is extremely symmetric and the whole phase diagram in two color case can be obtained just by dualities from the phase structure of three color case. This shows that the dualities are rather usefull tool. It is shown that chiral imbalance generates charged pion condensation phenomenon in conditions of matter in neutron stars, i. e. electrically neutral and $$\beta $$ -equilibrated dense quark matter. And that diquark condensation does not prohibit the generation of the charged PC phase by chiral imbalance at least in the two color case.

Cooling of isolated neutron stars with pion condensation: Possible fast cooling in a low-symmetry energy model

In this paper, we studied thermal evolution of isolated neutron stars (NSs) including the pion condensation core, with an emphasis on the stiffness of equation of state (EOS). Many temperature observations can be explained by the minimal cooling scenario which excludes the fast neutrino cooling process. However, several NSs are cold enough to require it. The most crucial problem for NS cooling theory is whether the nucleon direct Urca (DU) process is open. The DU process is forbidden if the nucleon symmetry energy is significantly low. Hence, another fast cooling process is required in such an EOS. As the candidate to solve this problem, we consider the pion condensation. We show that the low-symmetry energy model can account for most cooling observations including cold NSs, with strong neutron superfluidity. Simultaneously, it holds the [Formula: see text] observations even if the pion condensation core exists. Thus, we propose the possibility of pion condensation, as an exotic state to solve the problem in low-symmetry energy EOSs. We examined the consistency of our EOSs with other various observations as well.