Meson Supercurrent State in High-Density QCD

Journal Article · Fri Jan 13 04:00:00 EST 2006 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.012305· OSTI ID:20775007

Schaefer, T ^[1]

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1. Department of Physics, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina 27695 (United States)

The ground state of three flavor quark matter at asymptotically large density is believed to be the color-flavor-locked (CFL) phase. At nonasymptotic density the effect of the nonzero strange quark mass cannot be neglected. If the strange quark mass exceeds m{sub s}{approx}m{sub u}{sup 1/3}{delta}{sup 2/3}, the CFL state becomes unstable toward the formation of a neutral kaon condensate. Recently, several authors discovered that for m{sub s}{approx}(2{delta}p{sub F}){sup 1/2} the CFL state contains gapless fermions, and that the gapless modes lead to an instability in current-current correlation functions. Using an effective theory of the CFL state, we demonstrate that this instability can be resolved by the formation of a meson supercurrent, analogous to Migdal's p-wave pion condensate. This state has a nonzero meson current that is canceled by a backflow of gapless fermions.

• OSTI ID: 20775007
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Journal Name: Physical Review Letters Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 96; ISSN 0031-9007; ISSN PRLTAO
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
COLOR MODEL
CORRELATION FUNCTIONS
CURRENT ALGEBRA
FLAVOR MODEL
GROUND STATES
INSTABILITY
KAONS NEUTRAL
MASS
P WAVES
PIONS
QUANTUM CHROMODYNAMICS
QUARK MATTER
S QUARKS