Deconfinement and chiral restoration in nonlocal PNJL models at zero and imaginary chemical potential

TL;DR

This paper investigates deconfinement and chiral restoration transitions in nonlocal PNJL models, showing their critical temperatures are linked and consistent with lattice QCD, and analyzes the Roberge Weiss transition at finite imaginary chemical potential.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of the impact of dynamical quarks on the Polyakov potential scale in nonlocal PNJL models, aligning model predictions with lattice results.

Findings

Critical temperatures for deconfinement and chiral restoration are entangled.

The Roberge Weiss transition is first order at the endpoint.

Model results agree with lattice QCD data.

Abstract

We study the deconfinement and chiral restoration transitions in the context of non-local PNJL models, considering the impact of the presence of dynamical quarks on the scale parameter appearing in the Polyakov potential. We show that the corresponding critical temperatures are naturally entangled for both zero and imaginary chemical potential, in good agreement with lattice QCD results. We also analyze the Roberge Weiss transition, which is found to be first order at the associated endpoint.