Speaker
Andreas Windisch
(University of Graz)
Description
In the ongoing effort to map the QCD phase diagram, the region of low
temperature and moderately high density is particularly challenging for
theorists. The phase structure in that region is determined by
competition between Cooper pairing (driven by attractive strong
interactions) and the strange quark mass (which is a source of flavor
asymmetry, separating the Fermi momenta of the three quark flavors).
There are various proposed outcomes of this competition, including
crystalline ("LOFF") condensates and deformed Fermi surfaces. We argue
that a condensate of Cooper quartets rather than pairs is a strong
candidate for the ground state. The quartet is favored by the same QCD
attraction that drives Cooper pairing, but with four quarks rather than
two it is easier to construct a translationally invariant condensate
that includes different flavors without paying an energy penalty due to
the flavor asymmetry. This concept is also applicable to other systems
of fermions with flavor asymmetry, including ultracold atoms and nuclear
matter.
| On behalf of collaboration: | None |
|---|
Authors
Andreas Windisch
(University of Graz)
Kai Schwenzer
(Washington University, St Louis)
Mark Alford
(Washington University, St Louis)
