Glueballs, gluon condensate, and pure glue QCD below T_c

TL;DR

This paper proposes a quasiparticle model for pure glue QCD below the critical temperature, linking the phase transition to gluon condensate behavior and glueball properties, aligning with lattice data.

Contribution

It introduces a mechanism involving gluon condensate decrease and glueball width increase as triggers for the deconfinement phase transition in pure glue QCD.

Findings

Gluon condensate decreases sharply near T_c

Thermal width of glueballs increases with temperature

Model aligns with recent lattice data on thermodynamics

Abstract

A quasiparticle description of pure glue QCD thermodynamics at T<T_c is proposed and compared to recent lattice data. Given that a gas of glueballs with constant mass cannot quantitatively reproduce the early stages of the deconfinement phase transition, the problem is to identify a relevant mechanism leading to the observed sudden increase of the pressure, trace anomaly, etc. It is shown that the strong decrease of the gluon condensate near T_c combined with the increasing thermal width of the lightest glueballs might be the trigger of the phase transition.