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Title: Theory of static quark forces

Journal Article · · Phys. Rev., D; (United States)

Working within the framework of classical algebraic chromodynamics, I develop a theory of the equilibrium color forces acting between stationary quarks. To identify the equations appropriate to describing static forces on a fixed time slice, I assume that the ''static'' color fields appear as the end point of a most probable tunneling process and satisfy the principle of virtual work. The static equations imply certain compatibility conditions on the orientations of discrete quark charges relative to the local color field. The static equations for chromodynamics take a simple form only at the instant of tunneling. Static forces and potentials calculated on this favored time slice describe the behavior of the system at all later times because of gluon energy conservation. When the static equations of algebraic chromodynamics for the qq-bar color-singlet force problem are rewritten as equations for the overlying SU(2) classical Yang-Mills field, they take the form of the equations of the 't Hooft-Polyakov model, but with the Higgs field reinterpreted as the static potential and, of course, with external source charges present. I develop these equations in a perturbation expansion in the color gluon coupling g. I conjecture that the relevant zeroth-order solution is the unit-topological-charge solution of 't Hooft and Polyakov, which appears to behave as a quark-confining ''bag.'' This solution contributes a zeroth-order orientation energy to the quark potential, which by the principle of virtual work must be extremal with respect to variations in the position and orientation of the ''bag.'' The orientation energy gives the qq-bar potential a repulsive central core, and also leads to a zeroth-order sigma/sup m//sub( n)/Q/sup eff//sub( n)/ x B/sup m/ interaction between the quark spins and the ''bag'' color magnetic field. The compatibility conditions guarantee that the orientation energy is invariant under changes of gauge of the zeroth-order solution

Research Organization:
The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey 08540
OSTI ID:
7021506
Journal Information:
Phys. Rev., D; (United States), Vol. 18:2
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English