Flux tubes at finite temperature

Abstract

The chromoelectric field generated by a static quark-antiquark pair, with its peculiar tube-like shape, can be nicely described, at zero temperature, within the dual superconductor scenario for the QCD confining vacuum. In this work we investigate, by lattice Monte Carlo simulations of the SU(3) pure gauge theory, the fate of chromoelectric flux tubes across the deconfinement transition. We find that, if the distance between the static sources is kept fixed at about 0.76 fm 1.6/ √ σ and the temperature is increased towards and above the deconfinement temperature T c , the amplitude of the field inside the flux tube gets smaller, while the shape of the flux tube does not vary appreciably across deconfinement. This scenario with flux-tube "evaporation" above T c has no correspondence in ordinary (type-II) superconductivity, where instead the transition to the phase with normal conductivity is characterized by a divergent fattening of flux tubes as the transition temperature is approached from below. We present also some evidence about the existence of flux-tube structures in the magnetic sector of the theory in the deconfined phase.

QCD flux tubes across the deconfinement phase transition

“…In our recent studies color flux tubes dominantly made up of chromoelectric field directed along the line joining a static quark-antiquark pair have been investigated, in the cases of zero temperature [14,15,21] and nonzero temperature [22]. In the present paper we present new results obtained in studying the flux tubes across the deconfinement phase transition.…”

Hybrid static potential flux tubes from SU(2) and SU(3) lattice gauge theory

“…While such flux tubes have been studied for the ordinary static potential using lattice gauge theory for quite some time (see refs. [33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48]), this is a rather new direction for hybrid static potentials, where first results appeared only recently [49][50][51][52]. In this paper we substantially extend existing work by performing computations for seven hybrid static potential sectors characterized by quantum numbers Λ ( )…”

Flux tubes in the QCD vacuum

“…Many previous studies of our collaboration (or of a part of it) [10][11][12][13][14][18][19][20][21][22] have indeed furnished clear evidence that, at zero temperature, color flux tubes, made up almost completely by the longitudinal chromoelectric field directed along the line joining a static quark-antiquark pair, can be successfully described within the dual superconductivity picture, both in SU(2) and in SU (3) pure gauge theories. In our most recent paper [42] the investigation of the structure of flux tubes in SU(3) was extended to the case of nonzero temperature and lead to the result that the flux tube between two static sources separated by a distance of about 0.76 fm survives even above the critical temperature T c of the deconfinement transition, keeping a more or less constant transverse shape, but housing in it a weaker and weaker chromoelectric field as the temperature increases. Such (somewhat surprising) phenomenon could be peculiar of the only value of the distance between the sources considered in that work and evidently motivates to extend the analysis to different values of the distance between the sources.…”