Spectrum of closed k-strings in D=2+1

TL;DR

This study computes the excitation spectrum of closed k-strings in 2+1 dimensional SU(N) gauge theories, revealing their representation sectors and consistency with effective string theories, with notable corrections and unbound states.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed spectrum analysis of k=2 strings in 2+1 dimensions, showing their representation structure and relation to effective string models.

Findings

Spectrum splits into antisymmetric and symmetric sectors.

Lightest states match Nambu-Goto string predictions.

Corrections to free string are of order one.

Abstract

We calculate the excitation spectrumof closed k-strings in 2+1 dimensional SU(N) gauge theories for N = 4, 5 and k = 2. Our results demonstrate that the low-lying spectrum of the k = 2 string falls into sectors that belong to nearly pure antisymmetric and symmetric representations, showing that k-strings know not only about the centre of the group, but also about the full group. We also observe that the lightest states in each irreducible representation are consistent with what one would expect from an effective string theory that belongs to the same bosonic universality class (Nambu-Goto) as the fundamental string. We find that the corrections compared to the free string theory are of O(1), in striking contrast to the very small correction observed for the fundamental string. We also observe unbound w = 2 states.