The two-Equation of State (EoS) model is used to describe the hadron-quark phase transition in asymmetric matter formed at high density in heavy-ion collisions. For the quark phase, the three-flavor Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (NJL) effective theory is used to investigate the influence of dynamical quark mass effects on the phase transition. At variance to the MIT-Bag results, with fixed current quark masses, the main important effect of the chiral dynamics is the appearance of an End-Point for the coexistence zone. We show that a first order hadron-quark phase transition may take place in the region T=(50-80)MeV and ρ_B=(2-4)ρ_0, which is possible to be probed in the new planned facilities, such as FAIR at GSI-Darmstadt and NICA at JINR-Dubna. From isospin properties of the mixed phase somepossible signals are suggested. The importance of chiral symmetry and dynamical quark mass on the hadron-quark phase transition is stressed. The difficulty of an exact location of Critical-End-Point comes from its appearance in a region of competition between chiral symmetry breaking and confinement, where our knowledge of effective QCD theories is still rather uncertain.
The masses of hadrons in the vacuum, where the chiral symmetry is restored, and in the medium are in general different even when the changes in the order parameters of chiral symmetry are the same. Here, we first discuss the relation between the hadron masses and the chiral symmetry breaking in approaches based on operator product expansion (OPE). We then discuss what additional changes occur to the hadron masses when going from the chiral symmetry restored vacuum to nuclear medium and/or finite temperature. The work will highlight how we can identify the effects of chiral symmetry restoration…
The medium modifications of the energies of kaons and antikaons in isospin asymmetric hyperonic matter are investigated using a chiral SU(3) model. The isospin dependent medium effects, are important for asymmetric heavy ion collision experiments, as well as relevant for the neutron star phenomenology as the bulk matter in the interior of the neutron star is highly isospin asymmetric. The effects of hyperons on the medium modifications of the kaons and antikaons in the strange hadronic matter are investigated in the present work and are seen to be appreciable for hadronic matter with large str…
We study the properties of $D$ and $\bar{D}$ mesons in hot isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter, arising due to their interactions with the hadrons in the hyperonic medium. The interactions of $D$ and $\bar{D}$ mesons with these light hadrons are derived by generalizing the chiral SU(3) model used for the study of hyperonic matter to SU(4). We also study the mass modifications of the charmonium states $J/ψ$, $ψ(3686)$ and $ψ(3770)$ in the isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter at finite temperatures and investigate the possibility of the decay of the charmonium states into $D\bar D$ …
We consider the transition from quark to hadronic matter which may result during the cooling/expansion of the quark-gluon plasma formed in energetic collisions of weakly isospin-asymmetric ions. This transition involves the energy density of u and d quark matter and the one of nearly isospin-symmetric nuclear matter. Within bag models, the former entails knowledge of the bag pressure, a poorly constrained quantity. The bag pressure at high density can be fixed imposing equality of quark and nucleonic energy densities at the (assumed known) transition point. We find this value to be very model …
A systematic study of hadron masses and widths shows regular oscillations that can be fitted by a simple cosine function. This property can be observed when the difference between adjacent masses of each family is plotted versus the mean mass.
We confront the hypothesis of chemical freeze-out in ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions with the hypothesis of large modifications of hadron masses in nuclear medium. We find that the thermal-model predictions for the ratios of particle multiplicities are sensitive to the values of in-medium hadronic masses. In particular, the $π^+/p$ ratio decreases by 35% when the masses of all hadrons (except for pseudo-Goldstone bosons) are scaled down by 30%.
In the present work we study the hadron-quark phase transition with boson condensation in asymmetric matter by investigating the binodal surface and extending it to finite temperature in order to mimic the QCD phase diagram. We consider a system with two conserved charges (isospin and baryon densities) using the Gibbs' criteria for phase equilibrium. In order to obtain these conditions we use two different models for the two possible phases, namely the non-linear Walecka model (NLWM) for the hadron matter (also including hyperons) and the MIT bag model for the quark phase. It is shown that the…
We calculate the masses of the vector and axial-vector mesons as well as the nucleon and the delta resonance in the chiral symmetry restored vacuum. This is accomplished by separating the quark operators appearing in the QCD sum rules for these hadrons into the chiral symmetric and symmetry breaking parts depending on the contributions of the fermion zero modes. We then extract the vacuum expectation values of all the separated parts of the quark operators using the QCD sum rule relations for these hadrons with their vacuum masses and widths. By taking the chiral symmetry breaking parts to be …
We study the propagation of non-strange and strange meson modes in hadronic matter considering both isospin and strangeness mixings induced by quantum fluctuations in the medium. Baryons are described using the Quark Meson Coupling model extended to include interactions of strange quarks. In particular we evaluate the dependence of the meson masses on the baryonic density, the strangeness fraction and the isospin asymmetry of the medium. We have found a considerable admixture of strangeness and isospin in the sigma-mode in the high density regime.
Hadron masses under strong magnetic fields are studied. In the presence of strong magnetic fields exceeding the QCD energy scale $ eB \gg Λ^2_{\rm QCD} $, ${\rm SU(3)}_{\rm flavor} \otimes {\rm SU(2)}_{\rm spin}$ symmetry of hadrons is explicitly broken so that the quark components of hadrons differ from those with zero or weak magnetic fields $ eB \lesssim Λ^2_{\rm QCD} $. Also, squeezing of hadrons by strong magnetic fields affects the hadron mass spectrum. We develop a quark model which appropriately incorporates these features and analytically calculate various hadron masses including meso…
We calculate the effects of finite density of isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter, for different strangeness fractions, on the in-medium properties of vector $\left( D^{\ast}, D_{s}^{\ast}, B^{\ast}, B_{s}^{\ast}\right)$ and axial-vector $\left( D_{1}, D_{1s}, B_{1}, B_{1s}\right)$ mesons using chiral hadronic SU(3) model and QCD sum rules. We focus on the evaluation of in-medium mass-shift and shift of decay constant of above vector and axial vector mesons. In QCD sum rule approach the properties e.g. masses and decay constants of vector and axial vector mesons are written in terms of …
Medium modification of the magnetic moments of octet baryons in the isospin asymmetric nuclear medium at finite temperature has been calculated using medium modified quark and baryon masses derived in chiral SU(3) quark mean field model. The magnetic moments of baryons are found to vary significantly as a function of density of nuclear medium as well as with the increase in isospin asymmetry of the medium. The rise of temperature is found to decrease the effect of isospin asymmetry on masses and magnetic moments of baryons. The results of present investigation may be helpful to understand the …
By means of a simple rescaling, modifications of hadron masses and widths are incorporated into the thermal analysis of particle ratios in ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We find that moderate, up to 20%, changes of hadron masses do not spoil the quality of the fits, which remain as good as those obtained without modifications. The fits with the modified masses yield, however, modified values of the optimal temperature and baryon chemical potential. In particular, with decreasing masses of all hadrons (except for pseudo-Goldstone bosons) the fitted values of the temperature and the ba…
The vacuum fluctuation (VF) effects on asymmetric nuclear matter are investigated. Masses of nucleons and mesons are modified in the nuclear medium by calculating the loop-diagram corrections and the density dependence of hadron masses is obtained. The relativistic Lagrangian density with the isovector scalar $δ$ meson is used to calculate the nuclear equation of state (EOS) in the framework of the relativistic mean-field (RMF) approach, the effects of the in-medium hadron masses on the properties of neutron stars are finally studied. With the inclusion of the VF corrections, the nuclear EOS b…
This article reviews lattice QCD results for the light hadron spectrum. We give an overview of different formulations of lattice QCD, with discussions on the fermion doubling problem and improvement programs. We summarize recent developments in algorithms and analysis techniques, that render calculations with light, dynamical quarks feasible on present day computer resources. Finally, we summarize spectrum results for ground state hadrons and resonances using various actions.
We calculate the in-medium masses of the bottomonium states ($Υ(1S)$, $Υ(2S)$, $Υ(3S)$ and $Υ(4S)$) in isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter at finite temperatures. The medium modifications of the masses arise due to the interaction of these heavy quarkonium states with the gluon condensates of QCD. The gluon condensates in the hot hadronic matter are computed from the medium modification of a scalar dilaton field within a chiral SU(3) model, introduced in the hadronic model to incorporate the broken scale invariance of QCD. There is seen to be drop in the masses of the bottomonium states…
We study the in-medium properties of $D$ and $\bar{D}$ mesons in isospin asymmetric hyperonic matter arising due to their interactions with the light hadrons. The interactions of $D$ and $\bar{D}$ mesons with these light hadrons are derived by generalizing the chiral SU(3) model used for the study of hyperonic matter to SU(4). The nucleons, the scalar isoscalar meson, $σ$ and the scalar-isovector meson, $δ$ as modified in the strange hadronic matter, modify the masses of $D$ and $\bar{D}$ mesons. It is found that as compared to the $\bar{D}$ mesons, the $D$ meson properties are more sensitive …
We calculate the effects of finite density and temperature of isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter, for different strangeness fractions, on the in-medium properties of vector $\left( D^{\ast}, D_{s}^{\ast}, B^{\ast}, B_{s}^{\ast}\right)$ and axial-vector $\left( D_{1}, D_{1s}, B_{1}, B_{1s}\right)$ mesons, using chiral hadronic SU(3) model and QCD sum rules. We focus on the evaluation of in-medium mass-shift and shift in decay constant of above vector and axial-vector mesons. In QCD sum rule approach, the properties, e.g., the masses and decay constants of vector and axial-vector mesons …
The masses of baryons containing a heavy quark are calculated to next-to-leading order in partially quenched heavy hadron chiral perturbation theory. Calculations are performed for three light flavors in the isospin limit and additionally for two light non-degenerate flavors. The results presented are necessary for extrapolating lattice QCD and partially quenched lattice QCD calculations of the heavy hadron masses.
The masses and radii of non-rotating and rotating configurations of pure hadronic stars mixed with self-interacting fermionic Asymmetric Dark Matter are calculated within the two-fluid formalism of stellar structure equations in general relativity. The Equation of State (EoS) of nuclear matter is obtained from the density dependent M3Y effective nucleon-nucleon interaction. We consider dark matter particle mass of 1 GeV. The EoS of self-interacting dark matter is taken from two-body repulsive interactions of the scale of strong interactions. We explore the conditions of equal and different rot…
We present the first Dyson-Schwinger equation calculation of the light hadron spectrum that simultaneously correlates the masses of meson and baryon ground- and excited-states within a single framework. At the core of our analysis is a symmetry-preserving treatment of a vector-vector contact interaction. In comparison with relevant quantities the root-mean-square-relative-error/degree-of freedom is 13%. Notable amongst our results is agreement between the computed baryon masses and the bare masses employed in modern dynamical coupled-channels models of pion-nucleon reactions. Our analysis prov…
The measured particle ratios in central heavy-ion collisions at RHIC-BNL are investigated within a chemical and thermal equilibrium chiral SU(3) σ-ωapproach. The commonly adopted noninteracting gas calculations yield temperatures close to or above the critical temperature for the chiral phase transition, but without taking into account any interactions. Contrary, the chiral SU(3) model predicts temperature and density dependent effective hadron masses and effective chemical potentials in the medium and a transition to a chirally restored phase at high temperatures or chemical potentials. Three…
A quantitative study of the effects of dynamical chiral symmetry breaking on the mass generation of the low-lying hadrons in a dynamical lattice QCD simulation is presented. The evolution of light hadron masses upon increasing the number of low-lying Dirac operator eigenmodes in the quark propagators is confronted with the hadron masses obtained upon removal of such low-lying eigenmodes from standard full quark propagators. The low-lying chiral symmetry breaking modes provide roughly two third of the nucleon and $ρ$ masses, while the $a_1$ mass is affected to a much smaller degree.
The shear ($η$) and bulk ($ζ$) viscosities are calculated in a quasiparticle relaxation time approximation for a hadron matter described within the relativistic mean-field based model with scaled hadron masses and couplings. Comparison with results of other models is presented. We demonstrate that a small value of the shear viscosity to entropy density ratio required for explaining a large elliptic flow observed at RHIC may be reached in the hadron phase. Large values of the bulk viscosity are noted in case of the baryon enriched matter.
We study the medium modifications of the spectral functions as well as production cross-sections of the strange vector mesons ($ϕ$, $K^*$ and $\bar {K^*}$) in isospin asymmetric strange hadronic matter. These are obtained from the in-medium masses of the open strange mesons and the decay widths $ϕ\rightarrow K\bar K$, $K^* \rightarrow Kπ$ and $\bar {K^*} \rightarrow {\bar K}π$ in the hadronic medium. The decay widths are computed using a field theoretic model of composite hadrons with quark/antiquark constituents, from the matrix element of the light quark-antiquark pair creation term of the f…
The quark-meson coupling model, based on a mean-field description of non-overlapping nucleon bags bound by the self-consistent exchange of $σ$, $ω$ and $ρ$ mesons, is extended to investigate the change of hadron properties in finite nuclei. Relativistic Hartree equations for spherical nuclei have been derived from a relativistic quark model of the structure of bound nucleons and mesons. Using this unified, self-consistent description of both infinite nuclear matter and finite nuclei, we investigate the properties of some closed-shell nuclei, and study the changes in the hadron masses of the no…
An extended version of the Zimanyi-Moskowski (ZM) model has been used to calculate the temperature dependence of the hadronic masses. The calculation of meson masses in the Random Phase Approximation (RPA) gives an increase in the $σ$, $ω$ and $π$ effective masses with temperature.
Using a self-consistent, Hartree description for both infinite nuclear matter and finite nuclei based on a relativistic quark model (the quark-meson coupling model), we investigate the variation of the masses of the non-strange vector mesons, the hyperons and the nucleon in infinite nuclear matter and in finite nuclei.
The notion that hadron masses scale according to the scaling of the quark condensate in hadronic matter, partly supported by a number of observations in finite nuclei, can be interpreted in terms of Harada-Yamawaki's ``vector manifestation" (VM) of chiral symmetry. In this scenario, near chiral restoration, the vector meson masses drop to zero {\it in the chiral limit} with vanishing widths. This scenario appears to differ from the standard linear sigma model scenario. We exploit a link between the VM and color-flavor locking inferred by us from lattice data on quark number susceptibility (QNS…
The in-medium masses and optical potentials of $B$ and ${\bar B}$ mesons are studied in an isospin asymmetric, strange, hot and dense hadronic environment using a chiral effective model. The chiral $SU(3)$ model originally designed for the light quark sector, is generalized to include the heavy quark sector ($c$ and $b$) to derive the interactions of the $B$ and ${\bar B}$ mesons with the light hadrons. Due to large mass of bottom quark, we use only the empirical form of these interactions for the desired purpose, while treating the bottom degrees of freedom to be frozen in the medium. Hence, …
The in-medium properties of $D_S$ mesons are investigated within the framework of an effective hadronic model, which is a generalization of a chiral SU(3) model, to SU(4), in order to study the interactions of the charmed hadrons. In the present work, the $D_s$ mesons are observed to experience net attractive interactions in a dense hadronic medium, hence reducing the masses of the $D_S^+$ and $D_S^-$ mesons from the vacuum values. While this conclusion holds in both nuclear and hyperonic media, the magnitude of the mass drop is observed to intensify with the inclusion of strangeness in the me…
The density dependent relativistic hadron field (DDRH) theory is applied to strongly asymmetric nuclear matter and finite nuclei far off stability. A new set of in-medium meson-nucleon vertices is derived from Dirac-Brueckner Hartree-Fock (DBHF) calculations in asymmetric matter, now accounting also for the density dependence of isovector coupling constants. The scalar-isovector $δ$ meson is included. Nuclear matter calculations show that it is necessary to introduce a momentum correction in the extraction of coupling constants from the DBHF self-energies in order to reproduce the DBHF equatio…
We investigate the mass spectra of exotic hadrons known as hexaquarks in the form of dibaryons. We use a phenomenological model based on an extended version of the Gürsey-Radicati mass formula for hadrons to include non-charmed baryons, charmed baryons, and non-strange dibaryons to be able to predict masses of potential dibaryon states. We perform six numerical fits of this model to input data for three different sets of masses of baryons and dibaryons. We find that the model can fit some of the data sets well, especially the sets including charmed baryons and non-strange dibaryons, and observ…
We study the in-medium masses of the charmonium states $J/ψ$ and $η_{c}$ in the nuclear medium using QCD sum rule approach. These mass modifications arise due to modifications of the scalar and the twist-2 gluon condensates in the hot hadronic matter. The scalar gluon condensate, $<\frac{α_{s}}π G^a_{μν} {G^a}^{μν}>$ and the twist-2 tensorial gluon operator, $<\frac{α_{s}}π G^a_{μσ} {{G^a}_ν}^σ>$ in the nuclear medium are calculated from the medium modification of a scalar dilaton field introduced to incorporate trace anomaly of QCD within the chiral SU(3) model used in the present investigati…
The momentum and isospin dependence of the in-medium nucleon mass are studied. Two definitions of the effective mass, i.e. the Dirac mass $m^*_D$ and the nonrelativistic mass $m^*_{NR}$ which parameterizes the energy spectrum, are compared. Both masses are determined from relativistic Dirac-Brueckner-Hartree-Fock calculations. The nonrelativistic mass shows a distinct peak around the Fermi momentum. The proton-neutron mass splitting in isospin asymmetric matter is $m^*_{D,n} <m^*_{D,p}$ and opposite for the nonrelativistic mass, i.e. $m^*_{NR,n} >m^*_{NR,p}$, which is consistent with nonrelati…
Relations among the effective hadron masses and the effective interactions in nuclear matter are studied by using the generalized relativistic mean field theory. We found that we can make the effective omega-meson mass smaller and the equation of state softer if we require that the omega-meson mean field is proportional to the baryon density. In this case, there is a simple and exact relation between the effective omega-meson mass and the effective omega-nucleon coupling. Because of this relation, the effective omega-nucleon coupling automatically decreases if the effective omega-meson mass de…
The proposed earlier relativistic mean-field model with hadron masses and coupling constants depending on the $σ$-meson field is generalized to finite temperatures. Within this approach we simulate the in-medium behavior of the hadron masses motivated by the Brown-Rho scaling. The high-lying baryon resonances and boson excitations as well as excitations of the $σ$, $ω$ and $ρ$ fields interacting via mean fields are incorporated into this scheme. Thermodynamic properties of hot and dense hadronic matter are elaborated with the constructed equation of state. Even at zero baryon density, effectiv…
A Fermi liquid model for hadrons has been suggested for the hadrons in medium. The hadrons are supposed to behave like quasi particle as Fermi excitation while in the medium and the effective mass of the hadrons have been estimated using Fermi liquid model. Considering a momentum dependent potential inside the medium to describe the interaction, the effective masses of the hadrons are estimated. The temperature dependence of effective masses has also been studied. The possibility of describing masses of the quarks as Fermi excitation has been investigated. Compressibility, specific heats, dens…
The role of effective hadron masses and effective couplings in nuclear matter is studied using a generalized effective Lagrangian for sigma-omega model. A simple relation among the effective masses, the effective couplings and the incompressibility K is derived. Using the relation, it is found that the effective repulsive and the effective attractive forces are almost canceled to each other at the normal density. Inversely, if this cancellation is almost complete, K should be 250-350MeV.
We discuss various mechanisms for the creation of an asymmetric charge fluctuation with respect to the reaction plane among hadrons emitted in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We show that such mechanisms exist in both, the hadronic gas and the partonic phases of QCD. The mechanisms considered here all require the presence of a strong magnetic field (the ``chiral magnetic effect''), but they do not involve parity or charge-parity violations. We analyze how a transient local electric current fluctuation generated by the chiral magnetic effect can dynamically evolve into an asymmetric charge d…
Hadron masses show a specific dependence on the quark masses. Therefore, the variation of these masses can cause a resonance in a hadronic scattering amplitude to become a bound state. Consequently, the amplitude exhibits a non-analytic behavior at this transition. Crossed amplitudes, where the resonance can be exchanged in the t-channel, can be shown to exhibit the same phenomenon by s-->t analytic continuation. This entails possible kinks in lattice quark mass extrapolations needed to compute hadronic observables.
Using a self-consistent quark model for nuclear matter we investigate variations of the masses of the non-strange vector mesons, the hyperons and the nucleon in dense nuclear matter (up to four times the normal nuclear density). We find that the changes in the hadron masses can be described in terms of the value of the scalar mean-field in matter. The model is then used to calculate the density dependence of the quark condensate in-medium, which turns out to be well approximated by a linear function of the nuclear density. Some relations among the hadron properties and the in-medium quark cond…
We study the phase transition of asymmetric hadronic matter to a quark-gluon plasma within the framework of a simple two-phase model. The analysis is performed in a system with two conserved charges (baryon number and isospin) using the stability conditions on the free energy, the conservation laws and Gibbs' criteria for phase equilibrium. The EOS is obtained in a separate description for the hadronic phase and for the quark-gluon plasma. For the hadrons, a relativistic mean-field model calibrated to the properties of nuclear matter is used, and a bag-model type EOS is used for the quarks and…
We emphasize the central role played by the spectral function in the description of hadrons in matter and discuss the applicability of the quasiparticle concept to the propagation of hadrons in dense nuclear matter. Theoretical and experimental results relevant for the in medium properties of vector mesons and kaons are briefly reviewed. We also present novel results for the $ρ$ and $ω$ spectral functions in nuclear matter, deduced from a coupled channel analysis of pion-nucleon scattering data.
Excited-state uncertainties in lattice-QCD calculations of hadron masses and scattering phase shifts
Massachusetts Institute of Technology（麻省理工学院）；University of Maryland, College Park（马里兰大学帕克分校）；Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory（费米国家加速器实验室）；University of Washington（华盛顿大学）；Pacific Northwest National Laboratory（太平洋西北国家实验室）
Temperature dependence of hadronic decay widths and masses are studied within the framework of an effective Lagrangian approach. At finite temperature the hadronic masses do not seem to follow a universal scaling law. Considering an exhaustive set of hadronic reactions and vector meson decays we have estimated the photon spectrum emitted from hot hadronic matter taking into account medium effects through thermal loop corrections on the hadronic decay widths and masses. An enhancement in photon emission rate is obtained when we use the in-medium masses of vector mesons in our calculations. It i…
Here we continue to elaborate properties of the relativistic mean-field based model (SHMC) proposed in ref. [6] where hadron masses and coupling constants depend on the $σ$-meson field. The validity of approximations used in [6] is discussed. We additionally incorporate contribution of meson excitations to the equations of motion. We also estimate the effects of the particle width. It is demonstrated that the inclusion of the baryon-baryon hole and baryon-antibaryon loop terms, if performed perturbatively, destroys the consistency of the model.
We investigate hadron spectra in 2-color QCD using lattice simulation with $N_{f}=2$ at low temperature and finite density in which there appears not only the hadronic phase but also the superfluid phase. We first calculate the pion and rho meson spectrum, which is well-known from previous works. The spectral ordering of these mesons flips around the quark chemical potential $μ=m^{0}_π/2$ ($m^{0}_π$: the pion mass at $μ=0$), where the phase transition between the hadronic and superfluid phases occurs. For $μ\gtrsim m^{0}_π/2$, the effective mass for the pion linearly increases while the one fo…
A systematic study of hadronic masses shows regular oscillations that can be fitted by a simple cosine function. This property can be observed when the difference between adjacent masses of each family is plotted versus the mean mass. This symmetry of oscillation is also observed for the nuclear level masses of given spin.
We study the modification of hadron masses due to the vacuum polarization using the chiral sigma model, which is extended to generate the $ω$ meson mass by the sigma condensation in the vacuum in the same way as the nucleon mass. The results obtained in the chiral sigma model are compared with those obtained in the Walecka model which includes $σ$ and $ω$ mesons in a non-chiral fashion. It is shown that both the nucleon mass and the $ω$ meson mass decrease in nuclear medium, while the $σ$ meson mass increases at finite density in the chiral sigma model.
We show that in strongly coupled N=4 SYM the binding energy of a heavy and a light quark is independent of the strength of the coupling constant. As a consequence we are able to show that in the presence of light quarks the analog of the QCD string can snap and color charges are screened. The resulting neutral mesons interact with each other only via pion exchange and we estimate the masses
We investigate the properties of the neutron star with relativistic mean field models. We incorporate in the quantum hadrodynamics and in the quark-meson coupling models a possible reduction of meson masses in nuclear matter. The equation of state for neutron star matter is obtained and is employed in Oppenheimer-Volkov equation to extract the maximum mass of the stable neutron star. We find that the equation of state, the composition and the properties of the neutron stars are sensitive to the values of the meson masses in medium.
We calculate properties of neutron stars such as mass and radius using a relativistic Dirac-Brueckner-hartree-Fock apprach for asymmetric nuclear matter. For pure neutron matter we find the maximum mass to be 2.4 solar masses with a radius of 12 km. For a proton fraction of 30% we find a max mass of 2.1 solar masses and a radius of 10.5 km. The implications are discussed.
Our progress in computing the spectrum of excited baryons and mesons in lattice QCD is described. Sets of spatially-extended hadron operators with a variety of different momenta are used. A new method of stochastically estimating the low-lying effects of quark propagation is utilized which allows reliable determinations of temporal correlations of both single-hadron and multi-hadron operators. The method is tested on the isoscalar mesons in the scalar, pseudoscalar, and vector channels, and on the two-pion system of total isospin I=0,1,2.
