Holography of the Quark Matter Triple Point

TL;DR

This paper uses holographic models to estimate the location of the quark matter triple point, suggesting it occurs around 70 MeV temperature and 1100 MeV chemical potential, based on a novel string effect.

Contribution

It introduces a holographic approach involving a non-perturbative string effect to estimate the quark matter triple point's position.

Findings

Estimated triple point at ~70 MeV temperature

Chemical potential around 1100 MeV

Holographic lower bound consistent with bounds from other methods

Abstract

The quark matter phase diagram is believed to contain two distinguished points, lying on the boundary of the Quark-Gluon Plasma phase: a critical point and a triple point. In the holographic ["AdS/QCD"] approach, the region of relatively low chemical potentials around the phase transition near the critical point may be described using generalizations of the Hawking-Page transition. We propose that the \emph{other} QGP phase line, beginning at the triple point and rising towards the region of extremely high temperatures and chemical potentials, is described instead by a non-perturbative string effect discovered by Seiberg and Witten. Using an assumed position for the critical point, we are able to use this proposal to obtain a holographic lower bound on the temperature of the triple point. Combined with Shuryak's upper bound on this temperature, this leads to a rough estimate of the location of the triple point, at a temperature of around 70 MeV, and a chemical potential of about 1100 MeV.