Magnetic catalysis and inverse magnetic catalysis in QCD

Niklas Mueller and Jan M. Pawlowski
Phys. Rev. D 91, 116010 – Published 22 June 2015

Abstract

We investigate the effects of strong magnetic fields on the QCD phase structure at vanishing density by solving the gluon and quark gap equations, and by studying the dynamics of the quark scattering with the four-Fermi coupling. The chiral crossover temperature as well as the chiral condensate are computed. For asymptotically large magnetic fields we find magnetic catalysis, while we find inverse magnetic catalysis for intermediate magnetic fields. Moreover, for large magnetic fields the chiral phase transition for massless quarks turns into a crossover. The underlying mechanisms are then investigated analytically within a few simplifications of the full numerical analysis. We find that a combination of gluon screening effects and the weakening of the strong coupling is responsible for the phenomenon of inverse catalysis. In turn, the magnetic catalysis for large magnetic fields is already indicated by simple arguments based on dimensionality.

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  • Received 19 March 2015

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.91.116010

© 2015 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Niklas Mueller1 and Jan M. Pawlowski1,2

  • 1Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Heidelberg, Philosophenweg 16, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany
  • 2ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI, GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung mbH, Planckstraße 1, D-64291 Darmstadt, Germany

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Vol. 91, Iss. 11 — 1 June 2015

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