We give a pedagogical review of the properties of the various meson condensation phases triggered by a large isospin or strangeness imbalance. We argue that these phases are extremely interesting and powerful playground for exploring the properties of hadronic matter. The reason is that they are realized in a regime in which various theoretical methods overlap with increasingly precise numerical lattice QCD simulations, providing insight on the properties of color confinement and of chiral symmetry breaking.
We investigate the mesonic condensation in isospin matter under rotation. Using the two-flavor NJL effective model under the presence of global rotation, we demonstrate two important effects of the rotation on its phase structure: a rotational suppression of the scalar-channel condensates, in particular the pion condensation region; and a rotational enhancement of the rho condensation region with vector-channel condensate. A new phase diagram for isospin matter under rotation is mapped out on the $ω-μ_I$ plane where three distinctive phases, corresponding to $σ$, $π$, $ρ$ dominated regions res…
We present a renormalization-group (RG) flow argument for s-wave kaon condensation in dense nuclear-star matter predicted in chiral perturbation theory. It is shown that it is the {\it relevant} mass term together with {\it any} attractive interaction for the kaon in medium that triggers the instability. We show that a saddle point of multi-dimensional RG flow can imply a phase transition. Pion condensation is also analyzed along the same line of reasoning.
We revisit the suggestion that charged rho-mesons undergo Bose-Einstein condensation in isospin-rich nuclear matter. Using a simple version of the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio (NJL) model, we conclude that rho-meson condensation is either avoided or postponed to isospin chemical potentials much higher than the rho-meson mass as a consequence of the repulsive interaction with the preformed pion condensate. In order to support our numerical results, we work out a linear sigma model for pions and rho-mesons, showing that the two models lead to similar patterns of medium dependence of meson masses. As a byp…
We show that charged vector mesons cannot be condensed by a magnetic field. Although some hadron models predict the charged vector meson condensation in a strong magnetic field, we prove, by means of the Vafa-Witten theorem, that this is not the case in QCD. We also perform the numerical analysis for the meson mass and condensation in lattice QCD. The lattice QCD data confirm no charged vector meson condensation in a magnetic field.
In a QCD-like strongly coupled gauge theory at large N_c, using the AdS/CFT correspondence, we find that heavy quark deconfinement is accompanied by a coherent condensation of higher meson resonances. This is revealed in non-equilibrium deconfinement transitions triggered by static, as well as, quenched electric fields even below the Schwinger limit. There, we observe a "turbulent" energy flow to higher meson modes, which finally results in the quark deconfinement. Our observation is consistent with seeing deconfinement as a condensation of long QCD strings.
In this work pion and kaon condensation in the framework of chiral perturbation theory is studied. I consider a system at vanishing temperature with nonzero isospin chemical potential and strangeness chemical potential; meson masses and mixing in the normal phase, the pion condensation phase and the kaon condensation phase are described. There are differences with previous works, but the results presented here are supported by both theory group analysis and by direct calculations. Some pion decay channels in the normal and the pion condensation phases are studied, finding a nonmonotonic behavi…
We analyze various aspects of pion and kaon condensation in the framework of chiral perturbation theory. Considering a system at vanishing temperature and varying the isospin chemical potential and the strange quark chemical potential we reproduce known results about the phase transition to the pion condensation phase and to the kaon condensation phase. However, we obtain mesonic mixings and masses in the condensed phases that are in disagreement with the results reported in previous works. Our findings are obtained both by a theory group analysis and by direct calculation by means of the same…
We show that an antiferrosmectic-C phase has lower energy at high densities than the non-magnetized Fermi gas and ferronematic phases in an ultracold gas of fermionic atoms, or molecules, with large magnetic dipole moments. This phase, which is analogous to meson condensation in dense nuclear matter, is a one-dimensional periodic structure in which the fermions localize in layers with their pseudospin direction aligned parallel to the layers, and staggered layer by layer.
In a recent paper Y. Hidaka and A. Yamamoto [Phys. Rev. D 87 (2013) 094502] claim -- using both analytical and numerical approaches -- that the charged rho mesons cannot condense in the vacuum subjected to a strong magnetic field. In this Comment we point out that both analytical and numerical results of this paper are consistent with the inhomogeneous rho-meson condensation. Furthermore, we show that the numerical results of the paper support the presence of the expected (in quenched lattice QCD) crossover transition driven by the rho-meson condensation. Finally, we stress that the inhomogene…
The charged vector $ρ$ mesons in the presence of external magnetic fields at finite temperature $T$ and chemical potential $μ$ have been investigated in the framework of the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model. We compute the masses of charged $ρ$ mesons numerically as a function of the magnetic field for different values of temperature and chemical potential. The self-energy of the $ρ$ meson contains the quark-loop contribution, i.e. the leading order contribution in $1/N_c$ expansion. The charged $ρ$ meson mass decreases with the magnetic field and drops to zero at a critical magnetic field $eB_c$, wh…
We have considered the antikaon condensation in a neutron star in the presence of strong magnetic fields by using the modified quark-meson coupling (MQMC) model. The structure of the neutron star is investigated with various magnetic fields and different kaon optical potentials, and the effects of the magnetic fields for kaon condensation is discussed. When employing strong magnetic fields inside a neutron star with hyperons and kaon condensation, the magnetic fields can cause the equation of state to be stiff; thus, a large maximum mass of the neutron star can be obtained.
In this thesis work we have employed two microscopic models (ladder-QCD and Nambu-Jona-Lasinio) for describing the properties of the QCD phase diagram at finite temperature and quark densities. In particular, we have studied the mechanism of meson condensation at finite isospin and strangeness chemical potentials, and its competition with ``standard'' scalar fermionic condensates. In the last chapter, a detailed study of the chiral critical line at finite chemical potentials has been performed, achieving a remarkable agreement with recent lattice data.
We analyze the effect of an isospin chemical potential μ_I in the Sakai-Sugimoto model, which is the string dual of a confining gauge theory related to large N_c QCD, at temperatures below the chiral symmetry restoration temperature. For small chemical potentials we show that the results agree with expectations from the low-energy chiral Lagrangian, and the charged pion condenses. When the chemical potential reaches a critical value μ_I = μ_{crit} ~ 1.7 m_ρ, the lowest vector meson (the "rho meson") becomes massless, and it condenses (in addition to the pion condensate) for μ_I > μ_{crit}. Thi…
We use the Polyakov-loop extended two-flavor quark-meson model as a low-energy effective model for QCD to study the phase diagram in the $μ_I$--$T$ plane where $μ_I$ is the isospin chemical potential. In particular, we focus on the Bose condensation of charged pions. At $T=0$, the onset of pion condensation is at $μ_I={1\over2}m_π$ in accordance with exact results. The phase transition to a Bose-condensed phase is of second order for all values of $μ_I$ and in the $O(2)$ universality class. The chiral critical line joins the critical line for pion condensation at a point whose position depends…
We formulate kaon condensation in dense baryonic matter with anti-kaons fluctuating from the Fermi-liquid fixed point. This entails that in the Wilsonian RG approach, the decimation is effectuated in the baryonic sector to the Fermi surface while in the meson sector to the origin. In writing the kaon-baryon (KN) coupling, we will take a generalized hidden local symmetry Lagrangian for the meson sector endowed with a "mended symmetry" that has the unbroken symmetry limit at high density in which the Goldstone $π$, scalar $s$, and vectors $ρ$ (and $ω$) and $a_1$ become massless. The vector meson…
We study the asymmetric nuclear matter using a holographic QCD model by introducing a baryonic charge in the infrared boundary. We first show that, in the normal hadron phase, the predicted values of the symmetry energy and it's slope parameter are comparable with the empirical values. We find that the phase transition from the normal phase to the pion condensation phase is delayed compared with the pure mesonic matter: The critical chemical potential is larger than the pion mass which is obtained for the pure mesonic matter. We also show that, in the pion condensation phase, the pion contribu…
We discuss the phase structure of dense matter, in particular the nature of the transition between hadronic and quark matter. Calculations within a Ginzburg-Landau approach show that the axial anomaly can induce a critical point in this transition region. This is possible because in three-flavor quark matter with instanton effects a chiral condensate can be added to the color-flavor locked (CFL) phase without changing the symmetries of the ground state. In (massless) two-flavor quark matter such a critical point is not possible since the corresponding color superconductor (2SC) does not break …
Based on the QCD string picture at confining phase, we conjecture that the deconfinement transition always accompanies a condensation of higher meson resonances with a power-law behavior, "meson turbulence". We employ the AdS/CFT correspondence to calculate the meson turbulence for $\mathcal{N}=2$ supersymmetric QCD at large $N_c$ and at strong coupling limit, and find that the energy distribution to each meson level $n$ scales as $n^α$ with the universal scaling $α=-5$. The universality is checked for various ways to attain the quark deconfinement: a static electric field below/around the cri…
This paper describes dynamic and thermodynamic (at $T=0$) properties of mesons in asymmetric matter in the framework of Chiral Perturbation Theory. We consider a mesonic system at vanishing temperature with nonzero isospin chemical potential and strangeness chemical potential and we study their effect on the phase diagram. We also study meson masses and mixing in the resulting normal phase, pion condensation phase and kaon condensation phase. We find differences with previous papers regarding meson masses and mixing in the condensed phases; the results presented here are supported by theory gr…
Under the assumption of the Abelian dominance in QCD, we show that chiral condensate is locally present around a QCD monopole. The appearance of the chiral condensate around a GUT monopole was shown in the previous analysis of the Rubakov effect. We apply a similar analysis to the QCD monopole. It follows that the condensation of the monopole carrying the chiral condensate leads to the chiral symmetry breaking as well as quark confinement. To realize the result explicitly, we present a phenomenological linear sigma model coupled with the monopoles, in which the monopole condensation causes the…
We study relativistic mean-field models with hadron masses and coupling constants depending self-consistently on a scalar meson field. We demonstrate that by the field redefinition some models can be equivalently transformed into each other. Thereby the large variety of scaling functions for masses and couplings can be reduced to a restricted set of functions with a constrained dependence on a scalar field. We show how by choosing properly the latter scaling functions one may stiffen or soften the equation of state at high densities and simultaneously increase the threshold density for the dir…
Within the parity doublet model coupled to the linear sigma model including vector mesons it is possible to describe vacuum properties of the low energy mesons and to achieve nuclear saturation at nonzero density. Motivated by recent studies we investigate the emergence of inhomogeneous condensation in the parity doublet model. As a first step the chiral density wave (CDW) is con- sidered, which allows for a straightforward investigation of inhomogeneous condensation. As a result it is still possible to have a homogeneous ground state of nuclear matter, but at larger baryon chemical potential …
After a pedagogical introduction to the calculation of weak matrix elements on the lattice, I review some of the lattice's most recent predictions concerning the weak decays of $B$-mesons. Amongst the topics covered are the determinations of the leptonic decay constant $f_B$, of the form factors relevant for semi-leptonic $B\to D(D^*)\ell\barν$ decays and of the hadronic matrix element which describes the rare decay $B\to K^*γ$. Emphasis is placed on the results of the UKQCD Collaboration. Corrections to the heavy-quark limit are discussed extensively.
We study relativistic massive vector condensation due to a non zero chemical potential associated to some of the global conserved charges of the theory. We show that the phase structure is very rich. More specifically there are three distinct phases depending on the value of one of the zero chemical potential vector self interaction terms. We also develop a formalism which enables us to investigate the vacuum structure and dispersion relations in the spontaneously broken phase of the theory. We show that in a certain limit of the couplings and for large chemical potential the theory is not sta…
Internal and Lorentz symmetries are necessarily linked when considering non scalar condensates. Here I review vectorial type condensation due to a non zero chemical potential associated to some of the global conserved charges of the theory. The phase structure is very rich since three distinct phases exists depending on the value assumed by one of the zero chemical potential vector self interaction terms. In a certain limit of the couplings and for large chemical potential the theory is not stable. This limit corresponds to a gauge type limit often employed to economically describe the ordinar…
The quark-meson model is often used as an effective low-energy model for QCD to study the chiral transition at finite temperature $T$, baryon chemical potential $μ_B$, and isospin chemical potential $μ_I$. The parameters of the model are determined by matching the meson and quark masses, as well as the pion decay constant to their physical values using the on-shell and modified minimal subtraction schemes. In this paper, we study the possibility of different phases at zero temperature. In particular, we investigate the competition between an inhomogeneous chiral condensate and a pion condensat…
We study the stability of the color-flavor locked (CFL) phase of dense quark matter with regard to the formation of a non-zero Goldstone boson current. We show that an instability appears in the vicinity of the point $μ_s=Δ$ which marks the appearance of gapless fermion modes in the CFL phase. Here, $μ_s=m_s^2/(2μ)$ is the shift in chemical potential due to the strange quark mass and $Δ$ is the gap in the chiral limit. We show that in the Goldstone boson current phase all components of the magnetic screening mass are real. In this work we do not take into account homogeneous kaon condensation.…
We offer a diagrammatic derivation of the effective masses of the axial flavor excitations in the electrical and color neutral CFL phase of QCD. In particular we concentrate on the excitations with the quantum numbers of the kaons: we show how their effective chemical potentials, responsible of their Bose-Einstein condensation and found previously on the basis of pure symmetry arguments, arise at the microscopic level by loop effects. We perform also the numerical evaluation of the relevant loops in the whole CFL regime $M_s^2/2μΔ\leqslant 1$, showing the existence of the enhancement of the ka…
We study the two-flavor quark-meson (QM) model with the functional renormalization group (FRG) to describe the effects of collective mesonic fluctuations on the phase diagram of QCD at finite baryon and isospin chemical potentials, $μ_B$ and $μ_I$. With only isospin chemical potential there is a precise equivalence between the competing dynamics of chiral versus pion condensation and that of collective mesonic and baryonic fluctuations in the quark-meson-diquark model for two-color QCD at finite baryon chemical potential. Here, finite $μ_B=3μ$ introduces an additional dimension to the phase di…
A simple holographic model is presented and analyzed that describes chiral symmetry breaking and the physics of the meson sector in QCD. This is a bottom-up model that incorporates string theory ingredients like tachyon condensation which is expected to be the main manifestation of chiral symmetry breaking in the holographic context. As a model for glue the Kuperstein-Sonnenschein background is used. The structure of the flavor vacuum is analyzed in the quenched approximation. Chiral symmetry breaking is shown at zero temperature. Above the deconfinement transition chiral symmetry is restored.…
This is a pedagogical review of some selected topics of CP and T violation in the decays of K mesons. Diagonalization of the quark mass matrix and the emergence of the complex phase in both the standard and the left--right symmetric models is considered in great detail. Prominence is given to a correct definition of the CP-violating quantities: $ε, ε'$ {\it etc.} (with due regard for the Wu--Yang phase convention) and to formulation of the time-reversal invariance criterion in the elementary particle physics. A particular attention has been concentrated on theoretical evaluation of the paramet…
We show the existence of a pseudogap phase in the Nambu Jona-Lasinio model of quark interactions. In the pseudogap phase chiral symmetry is restored but q\bar q pseudoscalar mesons still exist and they are massive. Such a behavior is intermediate between a BCS superconductor and a Bose Einstein Condensate. We suggest the relevance of this phenomenon for an understanding of recent lattice QCD and experimental data.
We present results of the calculation of phase diagrams of the three-flavor NJL model as a function of temperature and different quark chemical potentials. These phase diagrams are an extension of earlier calculations in the literature in which either only the possibility of color superconductivity or the possibility of pseudoscalar condensation was investigated. This study takes into account both options and hence allows one to investigate their competition. It turns out that the color superconducting phase and the phase in which the pseudoscalar mesons condense are separated by a first order…
We study the rho meson in a uniform magnetic field eB using a holographic QCD-model, more specifically a D4/D8/Dbar8 brane setup in the confinement phase at zero temperature with two quenched flavours. The parameters of the model are fixed by matching to corresponding dual field theory parameters at zero magnetic field. We show that the up- and down-flavour branes respond differently to the presence of the magnetic field in the dual QCD-like theory, as expected because of the different electromagnetic charge carried by up- and down-quark. We discuss how to recover the Landau levels, indicating…
Here I review vectorial type condensation due to a non zero chemical potential associated to some of the global conserved charges of the theory. The phase structure is very rich since three distinct phases exists depending on the value assumed by one of the zero chemical potential vector self interaction terms. In a certain limit of the couplings and for large chemical potential the theory is not stable. This limit corresponds to a gauge type limit often employed to economically describe the ordinary vector mesons self interactions in QCD. Our analysis is relevant since it leads to a number of…
The core of neutron-star matter is supposed to be at a much higher density than the normal nuclear matter density for which various possibilities have been suggested such as, for example, meson or hyperon condensation and/or deconfined quark or color-superconducting matter. In this work, we explore the implication on hadron physics of a dense compact object that has three "phases", nuclear matter at the outer layer, kaon condensed nuclear matter in the middle and strange quark matter at the core. Using a drastically simplified but not unreasonable model, we develop the scenario where the diffe…
The properties of the kaon, $K$, and antikaon, $\kbar$, in nuclear medium are studied in the quark-meson coupling (QMC) model. Employing a constituent quark-antiquark (MIT bag model) picture, their excitation energies in a nuclear medium at zero momentum are calculated within mean field approximation. The scalar, and the vector mesons are assumed to couple directly to the nonstrange quarks and antiquarks in the $K$ and $\kbar$ mesons. It is demonstrated that the $ρ$ meson induces different mean field potentials for each member of the isodoublets, $K$ and $\kbar$, when they are embedded in asym…
The Equation of State and the properties of matter in the high temperature deconfined phase are analyzed by a quasiparticle approach for $T> 1.2~T_c$. In order to fix the parameters of our model we employ the lattice QCD data of energy density and pressure. First we consider the pure SU(3) gluon plasma and it turns out that such a system can be described in terms of a gluon condensate and of gluonic quasiparticles whose effective number of degrees of freedom and mass decrease with increasing temperature. Then we analyze QCD with finite quark masses. In this case the numerical lattice data for …
We study the phase diagram of two-color Quantum Chromodynamics at finite temperature and chemical potential. This is done within an effective low-energy description in terms of quarks, mesons and diquarks. Quantum, thermal and density fluctuations are taken into account with the functional renormalisation group approach. In particular, we establish the phenomenon of pre-condensation, affecting the location of the phase boundary to Bose-Einstein condensation. We also discuss the Silver Blaze property in the context of the functional renormalisation group.
Almost massless mesons created at the condensation scale of extra nonabelian gauge group can be candidates of dark energy source. This can be another motivation for introducing an additional confining force.
A pedagogical review of the past 50 years of study of resonances, leading to our understanding of the quark content of baryons and mesons. The level of this review is intended for undergraduates or first-year graduate students. Topics covered include: the quark structure of the proton as revealed through deep inelastic scattering; structure functions and what they reveal about proton structure; and prospects for further studies with new and upgraded facilities, particularly a proposed electron-ion collider.
Recent measurements of neutron star mass from several candidates (PSR J$1614-2230$, PSR J$0348+0432$, MSP J$0740+6620$) set the lower bound on the maximum possible mass for this class of compact objects $\sim 2$ M$_\odot$. Existence of stars with high mass brings the possibility of existence of exotic matter (hyperons, meson condensates) at the core region of the objects. In this work, we investigate the (anti)kaon ($K^-, \bar{K}^0$) condensation in $β-$equilibrated nuclear matter within the framework of covariant density functional theory. The functionals in the kaonic sector are constrained …
We use the Polyakov-loop extended two-flavor quark-meson model as a low-energy effective model for QCD to study 1) the possibility of inhomogeneous chiral condensates and its competition with a homogeneous pion condensate in the $μ$--$μ_I$ plane at $T=0$ and 2) the phase diagram in the $μ_I$--$T$ plane. In the $μ$--$μ_I$ plane, we find that an inhomogeneous chiral condensate only exists for pion masses lower that 37.1 MeV and does not coexist with a homogeneous pion condensate. In the $μ_I$--$T$ plane, we find that the phase transition to a Bose-condensed phase is of second order for all value…
Recently it was shown that vacuum in a background of strong enough magnetic field becomes an electromagnetic superconductor due to interplay between strong and electromagnetic forces. The superconducting ground state of the vacuum is associated with a spontaneous emergence of quark-antiquark condensates which carry quantum numbers of charged rho mesons. The rho-meson condensate is an inhomogeneous structure made of the so-called rho vortices, which are parallel to the magnetic field axis. The condensation of the charged rho mesons induces a (much weaker) superfluid-like condensate with quantum…
Phase diagram of the chiral random matrix model with U(1)A breaking term is studied with the quark chemical potentials varied independently at zero temperature, by taking the chiral and meson condensates as the order parameters. Although, without the U(1)A breaking term, chiral transition of each flavor can happen separately responding to its chemical potential, the U(1)A breaking terms mix the chiral condensates and correlate the phase transitions. In the three flavor case, we find that there are mixings between the meson and chiral condensates due to the U(1)A anomaly, which makes the meson …
We study a possible transition between symmetric nuclear matter and the diquark Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) matter at zero temperature. We find that chiral restoration transition is first order and coincides with deconfinement. We investigate various possible coexistence patterns which may emerge from the first order deconfinement phase transition by assuming different values for the critical deconfinement chemical potential. If deconfinement takes place at higher chemical potential, there exists a mixed phase of nuclear and chirally restored diquark BEC matter. This coexistence region exte…
We give a pedagogical review of the theory of CP violation with emphasis on the implications of recent experimental results. The review includes: (i) A detailed description of how CP violation arises in the Standard Model and in its extension that allows for neutrino masses; (ii) The formalism of CP violation in meson decays and its application to various K decays (ε_K, ε^\prime and K\toπνν), D decays (D\to Kπand D\to KK) and B decays (B\to\ellνX, B\toψK_S and B\toππ, including a discussion of the `penguin pollution' problem); (iii) Supersymmetry: the CP problems and the use of CP violation as…
We present a pedagogical review of the phenomenology of CP violation, with emphasis on B decays. Main topics include the phenomenology of neutral meson systems, CP violation in the Standard Model of electroweak interactions, and B decays. We stress the importance of the reciprocal basis, sign conventions, rephasing invariance, general definitions of the CP transformation and the spurious phases they bring about, CP violation as originating from the clash of two contributions, the rho-eta plane, the four phases of a generalized CKM matrix, and the impact of discrete ambiguities. Specific B deca…
