Anomalous spin polarization from turbulent color fields

Journal Article · 24 January 2022 · Physical Review. D.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.105.l011901 · OSTI ID:1980125

Müller, Berndt  ^[1]; Yang, Di-Lun  ^[2]

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1. Duke University, Durham, NC (United States); OSTI
2. Institute of Physics, Academia Sinica, Taipei (Taiwan)

Here we study the important, yet widely overlooked, role of gluons for spin transport with a connection to local parity violation in quark gluon plasmas. We employ the formalism of quantum kinetic theory to quarks in weakly coupled quantum chromodynamics to derive the source terms for quark spin polarization. These source terms involve parity-odd correlators of dynamically generated color fields in near-equilibrium quark gluon plasmas and give rise to locally fluctuating axial charge currents. Our results provide a possible explanation for the spin alignment of vector mesons measured in high-energy nuclear collisions.

• Research Organization: Duke University, Durham, NC (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (MOST); USDOE Office of Science (SC)
• Grant/Contract Number: FG02-05ER41367
• OSTI ID: 1980125
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D., Journal Name: Physical Review. D. Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 105; ISSN 2470-0010
• Publisher: American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English