Non-vanishing Chemical Potential Research Articles

Complex Langevin dynamics for dynamical QCD at nonzero chemical potential: A comparison with multiparameter reweighting

We study lattice QCD at non-vanishing chemical potential using the complex Langevin equation. We compare the results with multi-parameter reweighting both from $\mu=0$ and phase quenched ensembles. We find a good agreement for lattice spacings below $\approx$0.15 fm. On coarser lattices the complex Langevin approach breaks down. Four flavors of staggered fermions are used on $N_t=4, 6$ and 8 lattices. For one ensemble we also use two flavors to investigate the effects of rooting.

Boundary effects on Bose-Einstein condensation in ultra-static space-times

The boundary effects on the Bose-Einstein condensation with a nonvanishing chemical potential on an ultra-static space-time are studied. High temperature regime, which is the relevant regime for the relativistic gas, is studied through the heat kernel expansion for both Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions. The high temperature expansion in the presence of a chemical potential is generated via the Mellin transform method as applied to the harmonic sums representing the free energy and the depletion coefficient. The effects of boundary conditions on the relation between the depletion coefficient and the temperature are analyzed. Both charged and neutral bosons are considered.

Weak field collapse in AdS: introducing a charge density

We study the effect of a non-vanishing chemical potential on the thermalization time of a strongly coupled large $N_c$ gauge theory in $(2+1)$-dimensions, using a specific bottom-up gravity model in asymptotically AdS space. We first construct a perturbative solution to the gravity-equations, which dynamically interpolates between two AdS black hole backgrounds with different temperatures and chemical potentials, in a perturbative expansion of a bulk neutral scalar field. In the dual field theory, this corresponds to a quench dynamics by a marginal operator, where the corresponding coupling serves as the small parameter in which the perturbation is carried out. The evolution of non-local observables, such as the entanglement entropy, suggests that thermalization time decreases with increasing chemical potential. We also comment on the validity of our perturbative analysis.

Fermionic response in a zero entropy state ofN=4super-Yang-Mills

We analyze fermionic response in the geometry holographically dual to zero-temperature N=4 Super-Yang-Mills theory with two equal nonvanishing chemical potentials, which is characterized by a singular horizon and zero ground state entropy. We show that fermionic fluctuations are completely stable within a gap in energy around a Fermi surface singularity, beyond which non-Fermi liquid behavior returns. This gap disappears abruptly once the final charge is turned on, and is associated to a discontinuity in the corresponding chemical potential. We also show that the singular near-horizon geometry lifts to a smooth AdS_3 x R^3, and interpret the gap as a region where the quasiparticle momentum is spacelike in six dimensions due to the momentum component in the Kaluza-Klein direction, corresponding to the final charge.

Inhomogeneous phases in the quark-meson model with vacuum fluctuations

Inhomogeneous chiral-symmetry breaking phases at non-vanishing chemical potential and temperature are studied within a two-flavor quark-meson model in the chiral limit. The analysis is performed beyond the standard mean-field approximation by taking into account the Dirac-sea contributions of the quarks. Compared with the case where the Dirac sea is neglected, we find that the inhomogeneous phase shrinks, but in general does not disappear. It is shown within a Ginzburg-Landau analysis that the Lifshitz point of the inhomogeneous phase coincides with the tricritical point if the ratio between sigma-meson and constituent quark mass in vacuum is chosen to be $m_\sigma/M = 2$, corresponding to the fixed mass ratio in the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model. In the present model, however, this ratio can be varied, offering the possibility to separate the two points. This is confirmed by our numerical calculations, which demonstrate a strong sensitivity of the size of the inhomogeneous phase on $m_\sigma$. Finally, we uncover a general instability of the model with respect to large wave numbers of the chiral modulations, which calls for further improvements beyond the present approximation.

Finite temperature fermionic condensate and currents in topologically nontrivial spaces

We investigate the finite temperature fermionic condensate and the expectation values of the charge and current densities for a massive fermion field in a spacetime background with an arbitrary number of toroidally compactified spatial dimensions in the presence of a nonvanishing chemical potential. Periodicity conditions along compact dimensions are taken with arbitrary phases and the presence of a constant gauge field is assumed. The latter gives rise to Aharonov-Bohm-like effects on the expectation values. They are periodic functions of magnetic fluxes enclosed by compact dimensions with the period equal to the flux quantum. The current density has nonzero components along compact dimensions only. Both low- and high-temperature asymptotics of the expectation values are studied. In particular, it has been shown that at high temperatures the current density is exponentially suppressed. This behavior is in sharp contrast with the corresponding asymptotic in the case of a scalar field, where the current density linearly grows with the temperature. The features for the models in odd-dimensional spacetimes are discussed. Applications are given to cylindrical and toroidal nanotubes described within the framework of effective Dirac theory for the electronic subsystem.

Quantum entanglement and phase transition in a two-dimensional photon–photon pair model

We propose a two-dimensional model consisting of photons and photon pairs. In the model, the mixed gas of photons and photon pairs is formally equivalent to a two-dimensional system of massive bosons with non-vanishing chemical potential, which implies the existence of two possible condensate phases. Using the variational method, we discuss the quantum phase transition of the mixed gas and obtain the critical coupling line analytically. Moreover, we also find that the phase transition of the photon gas can be interpreted as second harmonic generation. We then discuss the entanglement between photons and photon pairs. Additionally, we also illustrate how the entanglement between photons and photon pairs can be associated with the phase transition of the system.

Bose—Einstein Condensation of Photons and Photon Pairs

We investigate the Bose-Einstein condensation of photons and photon pairs in a two-dimension optical microcavity. We find that in the paraxial approximation, the mixed gas of photons and photon pairs is formally equivalent to a two dimension system of massive bosons with non-vanishing chemical potential, which implies the existence of two possible condensate phase. We also discuss the quantum phase transition of the system and obtain the critical point analytically. Moreover, we find that the quantum phase transition of the system can be interpreted as second harmonic generation.

Thermofield quantum electrodynamics in (1 + 1) dimensions at a finite chemical potential: a bosonization approach

The recent generalization of the Lowenstein–Swieca operator solution of quantum electrodynamics in (1+1) dimensions to a finite temperature in thermofield dynamics is further generalized to include a non-vanishing chemical potential. The operator solution to the Euler–Lagrange equations respecting the Kubo–Martin–Schwinger condition is constructed. Two forms of this condition and their associated solutions are discussed. The correlation functions of an arbitrary number of chiral densities are computed in the thermal θ-vacuum.

Supersymmetric leptogenesis

We study leptogenesis in the supersymmetric standard model plus the seesaw. We identify important qualitative differences that characterize supersymmetric leptogenesis with respect to the non-supersymmetric case. The lepton number asymmetries in fermions and scalars do not equilibrate, and are related via a non-vanishing gaugino chemical potential. Due to the presence of new anomalous symmetries, electroweak sphalerons couple to winos and higgsinos, and QCD sphalerons couple to gluinos, thus modifying the corresponding chemical equilibrium conditions. A new constraint on particles chemical potentials corresponding to an exactly conserved R-charge, that also involves the number density asymmetry of the heavy sneutrinos, appears. These new ingredients determine the 3 × 4 matrices that mix up the density asymmetries of the lepton flavours and of the heavy sneutrinos. We explain why in all temperature ranges the particle thermodynamic system is characterized by the same number of independent quantities. Numerical differences with respect to usual treatment remain at the \U0001d4aa(1) level.

O(N) Universality and the Chiral Phase Transition in QCD

We discuss universal scaling properties of (2+1)-flavor QCD in the vicinity of the chiral phase transition at vanishing as well as non-vanishing light quark chemical potential (mu_l). We provide evidence for O(N) scaling of the chiral order parameter in (2+1)-flavor QCD and show that the scaling analysis of its derivative with respect to the light quark chemical potential provides a unique approach to the determination of the curvature of the chiral phase transition line in the vicinity of mu_l/T=0.

Chemical nonequilibrium for interacting bosons: Applications to the pion gas

We consider an interacting pion gas in a stage of the system evolution where thermal but not chemical equilibrium has been reached, i.e., for temperatures between thermal and chemical freeze-out T(ther) < T < T(chem) reached in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. Approximate particle number conservation is implemented by a nonvanishing pion number chemical potential mu(pi) within a diagrammatic thermal field-theory approach, valid in principle for any bosonic field theory in this regime. The resulting Feynman rules are derived here and applied within the context of chiral perturbation theory to discuss thermodynamical quantities of interest for the pion gas such as the free energy, the quark condensate, and thermal self-energy. In particular, we derive the mu(pi) not equal 0 generalization of Luscher and Gell-Mann-Oakes-Renner-type relations. We pay special attention to the comparison with the conventional kinetic theory approach in the dilute regime, which allows for a check of consistency of our approach. Several phenomenological applications are discussed, concerning chiral symmetry restoration, freeze-out conditions, and Bose-Einstein pion condensation.

Color neutrality effects in the phase diagram of the Polyakov--Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model

The phase diagram of a two-flavor Polyakov-loop Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model is analyzed imposing the constraint of color charge neutrality. The main effect of this constraint is a coexistence of the chiral symmetry breaking ($\ensuremath{\chi}\mathrm{SB}$) and two-flavor superconducting phases. Additional effects are a shrinking of the $\ensuremath{\chi}\mathrm{SB}$ domain in the $T\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\mu}$ plane and a shift of the end point to lower temperatures, but their quantitative importance is shadowed by the intrinsic uncertainties of the model. The effects can be understood in view of the presence of a nonvanishing color chemical potential ${\ensuremath{\mu}}_{8}$, which is introduced to compensate the color charge density ${\ensuremath{\rho}}_{8}$ induced by a background color gauge mean field ${\ensuremath{\phi}}_{3}$. At low temperatures and large chemical potentials the model exhibits a quarkyonic phase, which gets additional support from the diquark condensation.

Finite size scaling of meson propagators with isospin chemical potential

We determine the volume and mass dependence of scalar and pseudoscalar two-point functions in N_f-flavour QCD, in the presence of an isospin chemical potential and at fixed gauge-field topology. We obtain these results at second order in the \epsilon-expansion of Chiral Perturbation Theory and evaluate all relevant zero-mode group integrals analytically. The virtue of working with a non-vanishing chemical potential is that it provides the correlation functions with a dependence on both the chiral condensate, \Sigma, and the pion decay constant, F, already at leading order. Our results may therefore be useful for improving the determination of these constants from lattice QCD calculations. As a side product, we rectify an earlier calculation of the O(\epsilon^2) finite-volume correction to the decay constant appearing in the partition function. We also compute a generalised partition function which is useful for evaluating U(N_f) group integrals.

Remarks on Fermi liquid from holography

We investigate the signatures of Fermi liquid formation in the $\mathcal{N}=4$ super Yang-Mills theory coupled to fundamental hypermultiplet at nonvanishing chemical potential for the global $U(1)$ vector symmetry. At strong 't Hooft coupling the system can be analyzed in terms of the D7-brane dynamics in the ${\mathrm{AdS}}_{5}\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{S}^{5}$ background. The phases with vanishing and finite charge density are separated at zero temperature by a quantum phase transition. In the case of vanishing hypermultiplet mass, Karch, Son, and Starinets discovered a gapless excitation whose speed equals the speed of sound. We find that this zero sound mode persists to all values of the hypermultiplet mass, and its speed vanishes at the point of phase transition. The value of critical exponent and the ratio of the velocities of zero and first sounds are consistent with the predictions of Landau Fermi liquid theory at strong coupling.

Baryon number strangeness and electric charge fluctuations at zero and non-zero chemical potential

We present results on baryon number, strangeness and electric charge fluctuations in QCD at non-zero density and temperature obtained from lattice calculations with almost physical quark masses. At vanishing chemical potential, i.e. under conditions almost realized at RHIC and the LHC, quartic fluctuations of net baryon number and strangeness are large in a narrow temperature interval characterizing the transition region from the low to the high temperature phase. Our results are based on Taylor expansions in light and strange quark chemical potentials, i.e. we rigorously compute corrections to bulk thermodynamic quantities at non-vanishing chemical potential, by performing a Taylor expansion in μ/T. We find non-monotonic behavior for the radius of convergence of this series, which could be a hint for a critical end point in the (T, μ)-plane.

Neutrality of the color-flavor-locked phase in a Dyson-Schwinger approach

The role of neutrality constraints for the phase structure of QCD at nonvanishing chemical potentials is studied within a self-consistent truncation scheme for the Dyson-Schwinger equation of the quark propagator in Landau gauge. We find the (approximate) color-flavor-locked phase to be energetically preferred at all potentially relevant densities and for physical values of the quark masses. We furthermore observe the impossibility to define this phase by residual global symmetries and discuss the role of chemical potentials.

Lattice cut-off effects and their reduction in studies of QCD thermodynamics at non-zero temperature and chemical potential

We clarify the relation between the improvement of dispersion relations in the fermion sector of lattice regularized QCD and the improvement of bulk thermodynamic observables. We show that in the infinite temperature limit the cut-off dependence in dispersion relations can be eliminated up to O(a^n) corrections, if the quark propagator is chosen to be rotationally invariant up to this order. In bulk thermodynamic observables this eliminates cut-off effects up to the same order at vanishing as well as non-vanishing chemical potential. We furthermore show, that in the infinite temperature, ideal gas limit the dependence of finite cut-off corrections on the chemical potential is given by Bernoulli polynomials which are universal as they do not depend on a particular discretization scheme. We explicitly calculate leading and next-to-leading order cut-off corrections for some staggered and Wilson fermion type actions and compare these with exact evaluations of the free fermion partition functions. This also includes the chirally invariant overlap and domain wall fermion formulations.

Enforced neutrality and color-flavor unlocking in the three-flavor Polyakov-loop Nambu–Jona-Lasinio model

We study how the charge neutrality affects the phase structure of the three-flavor Polyakov-loop Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (PNJL) model. We point out that, within the conventional PNJL model at finite density, the color neutrality is missing because the Wilson line serves as an external colored field coupled to dynamical quarks. In this paper we heuristically assume that the model may still be applicable. To get color neutrality, one has then to allow nonvanishing color chemical potentials. We study how the quark matter phase diagram in $(T,{m}_{s}^{2}/\ensuremath{\mu})$-plane is affected by imposing neutrality and by including the Polyakov-loop dynamics. Although these two effects are correlated in a nonlinear way, the impact of the Polyakov loop turns out to be significant in the $T$ direction, while imposing neutrality brings a remarkable effect in the ${m}_{s}^{2}/\ensuremath{\mu}$ direction. In particular, we find a novel unlocking transition, when the temperature is increased, even in the chiral $SU(3)$ limit. We clarify how and why this is possible once the dynamics of the colored Polyakov loop is taken into account. Also we succeed in giving an analytic expression for ${T}_{c}$ for the transition from two-flavor pairing (2SC) to unpaired quark matter in the presence of the Polyakov loop.

Holographic QCD with isospin chemical potential

We consider configurations of D4?D8?8 branes which correspond to large N QCD with non-vanishing temperature and chemical potential for baryon number and isospin. We study the holographic dual of this model and find a rich phase structure. The phases, distinguished by the values of quark condensates, are separated by the surfaces of first order phase transitions. The picture is in many respects similar to the expected phase structure of QCD in the chiral limit.