Meson Dynamics Research Articles

Complete CP-eigen bases of meson-baryon chiral lagrangian up to p5-order

Chiral perturbation theory describes the low energy dynamics of mesons and baryons in terms of the nonlinear Goldstone boson and fermion degrees of freedom. Through the Young tensor technique, we construct the on-shell operator bases for the meson-baryon system up to p5-order, using the chiral dimension power counting and heavy baryon expansion. For the Lorentz structure, additional treatments on off-shell external sources and operators with higher derivatives are necessarily considered, while for the internal structure, the invariant tensor basis is converted into the trace basis equivalently, and Cayley-Hamilton relations are utilized to classify different CP eigen-operators. Finally we present the complete operator set of C+P+, C+P-, C-P+, and C-P- eigen-operators at the p5-order, and obtain the operator counting from the Hilbert series.

Defect induced heavy meson dynamics in the QCD conformal window

Upon introducing a heavy quark in the perturbative regime of the QCD conformal window we precisely determine the associated heavy meson spectrum and wave functions in terms of the number of light flavors and mass. We then compute the conformal Isgur-Wise function which is a central quantity in heavy quark physics. We further determine the impact of the residual low energy confining dynamics on the heavy meson spectrum. As a working framework, we adapt the heavy quark effective theory to the perturbative conformal window dynamics. Our work lays the foundations to systematically go beyond the infinite mass defect approximation in conformal field theories. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Isospin sum rules for the nonleptonic B decays

Isospin symmetry, as the most precise flavor symmetry, can be used to extract information about hadronic dynamics. The effective Hamiltonian for bottom quark weak decay is zero under the isospin lowering operators I-n\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$I_-^n$$\\end{document}, which allows us to generate isospin sum rules through several master formulas. In this work, we derive the master formulas of isospin sum rules for the two- and three-body non-leptonic decays of B mesons. Numerous new isospin sum rules, especially those involving three or more decay channels, are proposed. The isospin sum rules can be used to test isospin symmetry and provide hints the isospin partners of exotic hadrons in B decays. It is found ten percent isospin breaking only in decay modes involving two vector mesons, indicating the complex dynamics of vector mesons. Besides, the isospin analysis suggests the charm tetraquark resonances might be observed in the B-→J/Ψπ-K¯0\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ B^- \\rightarrow J/\\Psi \\pi ^-\\overline{K}^0$$\\end{document}, B¯0→J/ΨK¯0ϕ\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\overline{B}^0 \\rightarrow J/\\Psi \\overline{K}^0\\phi $$\\end{document}, and B¯0→D0D¯0K¯0\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\overline{B}^0\\rightarrow D^0\\overline{D}^0\\overline{K}^0$$\\end{document} modes.

Aharonov-Bohm effect for confined matter in lattice gauge theories

Gauge theories arise in physical systems displaying space-time local symmetries. They provide a powerful description of important realms of physics ranging from fundamental interactions to statistical mechanics, condensed matter, and, more recently, quantum computation. As such, a remarkably deep understanding has been achieved in the field. With the advent of quantum technology, lower energy analogs, capable of capturing important features of the original quantum field theories through quantum simulation, have been intensively studied. Here, we propose a specific scheme implementing an quantum simulation of lattice gauge theories constrained to mesoscopic spatial scales. To this end, we study the dynamics of mesons residing in a ring-shaped lattice of mesoscopic size pierced by an effective magnetic field. In particular, we find a type of Aharonov-Bohm effect that goes beyond the particlelike effect, reflecting the features of the confining gauge potential. The coherence properties of the meson are quantified by the persistent current and by specific features of the correlation functions. When the magnetic field is quenched, Aharonov-Bohm oscillations and correlations start a specific matter-wave current dynamics. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Strangeness in Neutron Stars

In this contribution I briefly review the dynamics of strange mesons and baryons with dense nuclear matter, paying a special attention to their pres ence in the inner core of neutron stars and the consequences for the structure of these compact stars.

Probing inequivalent forms of Leggett–Garg inequality in subatomic systems

We study various formulations of Leggett–Garg inequality (LGI), specifically, the Wigner and Clauser–Horne forms of LGI, in the context of subatomic systems, in particular, three flavor neutrino as well as meson systems. The optimal forms of various LGIs for either neutrinos or mesons are seen to depend on measurement settings. For the neutrinos, some of these inequalities can be written completely in terms of experimentally measurable probabilities. Hence, the Wigner and Clauser–Horne forms of LGI are found to be more suitable as compared to the standard LGI from the experimental point of view for the neutrino system. Further, these inequalities exhibit maximum quantum violation around the energies roughly corresponding to the maximum neutrino flux. The Leggett–Garg type inequality is seen to be more suited for the meson dynamics. The meson system being inherently a decaying system allows one to see the effect of decoherence on the extent of violation of various inequalities. Decoherence is observed to reduce the degree of violation, and hence the nonclassical nature of the system.

Heavy flavor dynamics across system size at the LHC

One of the fundamental signatures of the Quark Gluon Plasma has been the suppression of heavy flavor (specifically D mesons), which has been measured via the nuclear modification factor, RAA and azimuthal anisotropies, vn , in large systems. However, multiple competing models can reproduce the same data for RAA to vn . In this talk we break down the competing effects that conspire together to successfully reproduce RAA and vn in experimental data using Trento+v-USPhydro+DAB-MOD. Then using our best fit model we make predictions for RAA and vn across system size for 208PbPb, 129XeXe, 40ArAr, and 16OO collisions. We find that 0–10% centrality has a non-trivial interplay between the system size and eccentricities such that system size effects are masked in v2 whereas in 30–50% centrality the eccentricities are approximately constant across system size and, therefore, is a better centrality class to study D meson dynamics across system size.

Three-body unitarity versus finite-volume π+π+π+ spectrum from lattice QCD

Strong three-body interactions above threshold govern the dynamics of many exotics and conventional excited mesons and baryons. Three-body finite-volume energies calculated from lattice QCD promise an ab-initio understanding of these systems. We calculate the three-$\pi^+$ spectrum unraveling the three-body dynamics that is tightly intertwined with the $S$-matrix principle of three-body unitarity and compare it with recent lattice QCD results. For this purpose, we develop a formalism for three-body systems in moving frames and apply it numerically.

Strangeness and hypernuclear production in fragmentation reactions induced by antikaons

Formation mechanism of hyperfragments with strangeness s=-1 and s=-2 in collisions of antikaons on nuclei has been investigated within a microscopic transport model. Dynamics of pseudoscalar mesons and hyperons is modeled within the transport model, in which all possible reaction channels for creating hyperons such as the elastic scattering, resonance production and decay, strangeness exchange reaction and direct strangeness production in meson-baryon and baryon-baryon collisions have been included. A coalescence approach is developed for constructing hyperfragments in phase space and the decay process is described with a statistical approach. It is found that the $\Xi^{-}$ production is correlated to the K$^{+}$ formation and the hyperons $\Lambda$ and $\Sigma$ are created within a broad rapidity region. The production cross sections of nucleonic fragments and hyperfragments weakly depends on the incident momentum. The yields of $\Lambda-$ hyperfragments are the six order of magnitude of $\Xi^{-}-$ hyperfragments.

Probing hot and dense nuclear matter with K*, K¯* vector mesons

We investigate probing the hot and dense nuclear matter with strange vector mesons ($K^*, \bar{K}^*$). Our analysis is based on PHSD which incorporates partonic and hadronic dof and describes the full dynamics of HICs. This allows to study the $K^*$ and $\bar{K}^*$ meson formation from the QGP and the in-medium effects related to the modification of their properties during the propagation in dense and hot matter. We employ relativistic Breit-Wigner spectral functions for the $K^*,\bar{K}^*$ mesons with self-energies obtained from a G-matrix approach to study the role of in-medium effects on the $K^*$ and $\bar{K}^*$ meson dynamics in HIC from FAIR/NICA to LHC energies. According to our analysis most of the final $K^*/\bar{K}^*$s, that can be observed experimentally, are produced during the late hadronic phase and stem dominantly from the $K (\bar{K}) + \pi \to K^*(\bar{K}^*)$ formation channel. The amount of $K^*/\bar{K}^*$s originating from the QGP channel is comparatively small even at LHC energies and such $K^*/\bar{K}^*$s can hardly be reconstructed experimentally due to the rescattering of final pions and (anti-)kaons. This mirrors the results from our previous study on the strange vector-meson production in HICs at RHIC energies. The influence of the in-medium effects on the dynamics of the $K^*/\bar{K}^*$ is rather small since they are mostly produced at low baryon densities. Additional cuts on the shape of the observed signal and the range of the invariant mass region of the $K^*/\bar{K}^*$ also affect the final spectra. We demonstrate that the $K^*/\bar{K}^*$ in-medium effects are more visible at lower beam energy, e.g. FAIR/NICA and BES RHIC energies, where the production of $K^*/\bar{K}^*$s occurs at larger baryon densities. Finally, we present the experimental procedures to extract information on the in-medium masses and widths by fitting final mass spectra at LHC energies.

COMPASS: meson spectroscopy and low-energy meson dynamics

Within the broad physics programme of the COMPASS collaboration at CERN SPS, soft reactions of high-energy hadron beams on different nuclear targets are investigated. Aiming at a better understanding of the strong interaction, novel results range from tests of chiral symmetry breaking to properties of diffractively produced meson resonances studied in their multi-particle decays, such as the a1(1420) with unusual properties. The talk will highlight the challenges of the employed experimental techniques, and as well of the analysis methods, that are developed to a large extent along with the analysis of the world’s largest data sets in the field.

Concavity of the meson Regge trajectories

It is illustrated by the fitted Regge trajectories for a large majority of mesons that the radial and orbital Regge trajectories for mesons prefer being concave in the (nr,M2) and (l,M2) planes, respectively. The concavity of the meson Regge trajectories is model-independent. The concavity is expected to act as a criterion to choose a newly observed meson or to assign a particle to the unwell-established state. The concavity of the meson Regge trajectories can assist in model construction and in the choice of the appropriate model to describe mesons. The appropriate models should yield the spectra which can produce the concave Regge trajectories according to the concavity of the meson Regge trajectories. If the large majority of the meson Regge trajectories are concave while a few meson Regge trajectories are convex which neither have been confirmed nor have been completely excluded at present, many existing models should be corrected or even be reconstructed, which will lead to the further understanding of the meson dynamics.

Event-by-event study of space-time dynamics in flux-tube fragmentation

In the semi-classical description of the flux-tube fragmentation process for hadron production and hadronization in high-energy annihilations and pp collisions, the rapidity-space-time ordering and the local conservation laws of charge, flavor, and momentum provide a set of powerful tools that may allow the reconstruction of the space-time dynamics of quarks and mesons in exclusive measurements of produced hadrons, on an event-by-event basis. We propose procedures to reconstruct the space-time dynamics from event-by-event exclusive hadron data to exhibit explicitly the ordered chain of hadrons produced in a flux tube fragmentation. As a supplementary tool, we infer the average space-time coordinates of the q– pair production vertices from the rapidity distribution data obtained by the NA61/SHINE Collaboration in pp collisions at to 17.3 GeV.

K* vector meson resonance dynamics in heavy-ion collisions

We study the strange vector meson ($K^*, \bar K^*$) dynamics in relativistic heavy-ion collisions based on the microscopic Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport approach which incorporates partonic and hadronic degrees-of-freedom, a phase transition from hadronic to partonic matter - Quark-Gluon-Plasma (QGP) - and a dynamical hadronization of quarks and antiquarks as well as final hadronic interactions. We investigate the role of in-medium effects on the $K^*, \bar K^*$ meson dynamics by employing Breit-Wigner spectral functions for the $K^*$'s with self-energies obtained from a self-consistent coupled-channel G-matrix approach. Furthermore, we confront the PHSD calculations with experimental data for p+p, Cu+Cu and Au+Au collisions at energies up to $\sqrt{{s}_{NN}} = 200$~GeV. Our analysis shows that at relativistic energies most of the final $K^*$s (observed experimentally) are produced during the late hadronic phase, dominantly by the $K+ \pi \to K^*$ channel, such that the fraction of the $K^*$s from the QGP is small and can hardly be reconstructed from the final observables. The influence of the in-medium effects on the $K^*$ dynamics at RHIC energies is rather modest due to their dominant production at low baryon densities (but high meson densities), however, it increases with decreasing beam energy. Moreover, we find that the additional cut on the invariant mass region of the $K^*$ further influences the shape and the height of the final spectra. This imposes severe constraints on the interpretation of the experimental results.

Vacuum structure of vector mesons in QCD

We study the chiral dynamics of vector mesons in two-flavor QCD in vacuum by utilizing a functional renormalization group approach. This allows us to capture the dynamical transition from the quark-gluon phase at high energies to the hadronic phase at low energies without the necessity of model parameter tuning. We use this to analyze the scaling of vector meson masses towards the chiral symmetry breaking scale, the decoupling of the mesons at high energies and the validity of vector meson dominance.

In-medium and isospin effects on particle production near threshold energies in heavy-ion collisions

Dynamics of pseudoscalar mesons ($\pi$, $\eta$, $K$ and $\overline{K}$ ) and hyperons ($\Lambda$ and $\Sigma$) produced in heavy-ion collisions near threshold energies has been investigated within the Lanzhou quantum molecular dynamics (LQMD) transport model. The in-medium modifications on particle production in dense nuclear matter are implemented in the model through corrections on the elementary cross sections and by inclusion of the meson (hyperon)-nucleon potentials, in which the isospin effects are considered. It is found that the transportation of particles are influenced with the in-medium corrections. The total number of pions is reduced with an isospin, density and momentum dependent pion-nucleon potential. However, the ratios of charged pions is enhanced with inclusion of the potential. The production of eta in the domain of mid-rapidities and high momenta is sensitive to the $\eta$-nucleon potential, but weakly depends on symmetry energy. The attractive antikaon-nucleon potential enhances the subthreshold $\overline{K}$ production and also influences the structure of phase-space distributions. Dynamics of etas, kaons, antikaons and hyperons is also influenced by the pion potential because of collisions between pions and nucleons (resonances). The impacts of mean-field potentials on particle dynamics are investigated, such as the phase-space distributions from rapidity and transverse momentum spectra, inclusive invariant spectra, collective flows etc.

S= −1 meson-baryon interaction in hot and dense nuclear matter: chiral symmetry, many-body and unitarization for a road to GSI/FAIR

The dynamics of strange pseudoscalar and vector mesons in hot and dense nuclear matter is studied within a chiral unitary framework in coupled channels. Our results set up the starting point for implementations in microscopic transport approaches of heavy-ion collisions, particularly at the conditions of the forthcoming experiments at GSI/FAIR and NICA-Dubna. In the K̄ N sector we focus on the calculation of (off-shell) transition rates for the most relevant binary reactions involved in strangeness production close to threshold energies, with special attention to the excitation of sub-threshold hyperon resonances and isospin effects (e.g. K̄ p vs K̄ n). We also give an overview of recent theoretical developments regarding the dynamics of strange vector mesons (K*, K̄* and ϕ) in the nuclear medium, in connection with experimental activity from heavy-ion collisions and nuclear production reactions. We emphasize the role of hadronic decay modes and the excitation of hyperon resonances as the driving mechanisms modifying the properties of vector mesons.

Interplay of quark and meson degrees of freedom in a near-threshold resonance: Multi-channel case

We investigate the interplay of quark and meson degrees of freedom in a physical state representing a near-threshold resonance for the case of multiple continuum channels. The aim is to demonstrate the full complexity of near-threshold phenomena. It turns out that those are especially rich, if both quark and meson dynamics generate simultaneously weakly coupled near-threshold poles in the S-matrix. We study the properties of this scenario in detail, such as t-matrix and production amplitude zeros, as well as various effects of the continuum channels interplay.

Unruh effect and holography

We study the Unruh effect on the dynamics of quarks and mesons in the context of AdS 5/CFT 4 correspondence. We adopt an AdS 5 metric with the boundary Rindler horizon extending into a bulk Rindler-like horizon, which yields the thermodynamics with Unruh temperature verified by computing the boundary stress tensor. We then embed in it a probe fundamental string and a D7 brane in such a way that they become the dual of an accelerated quark and a meson in Minkowski space, respectively. Using the standard procedure of holographic renormalization, we calculate the chiral condensate, and also the spectral functions for both the accelerated quark and meson. Especially, we extract the corresponding strength of random force of the Langevin dynamics and observe that it can characterize the phase transition of meson melting. This result raises an issue toward a formulation of complementarity principle for the Rindler horizon. We find most of the dynamical features are qualitatively similar to the ones in the thermal bath dual to the AdS black hole background, though they could be quite different quantitatively.

Interplay of quark and meson degrees of freedom in a near-threshold resonance

We investigate the interplay of quark and meson degrees of freedom in a physical state representing a near-threshold resonance for the case of a single continuum channel. We demonstrate that such a near-threshold resonance may possess quite peculiar properties if both quark and meson dynamics generate weakly coupled near-threshold poles in the S-matrix. In particular, the scattering t-matrix may possess zeros in this case. We also discuss possible implications for production reactions as well as studies within lattice QCD.