Phenomenology of quarkyonic percolation at FAIR

TL;DR

This paper explores the concept of quarkyonic matter as a percolation phase transition, proposing a model for its occurrence at high densities and discussing potential experimental observations at FAIR.

Contribution

It introduces a percolation-based perspective on quarkyonic matter and provides a toy model estimate for its realization at realistic QCD parameters.

Findings

Quarkyonic matter can be viewed as a percolation phase transition.

A toy model suggests a percolating but confined phase at high densities for N_c=3.

Potential observables for this phase at FAIR are discussed.

Abstract

We will give an introduction to the concept of quarkyonic matter, presenting an overview of what is meant by this term in the literature. We will then argue that the quarkyonic phase, as defined in the original paper, is a percolation-type phase transition whose phase transition line is strongly curved in $\rho_B-N_c$ space, where $N_c$ is the number of colors and $\rho_B$ the baryon density. With a toy model estimate, we show that it might be possible to obtain a percolating but confined phase at $N_c=3,N_f=2$ at densities larger than one baryon per one baryon size. We conclude by discussing how this phase can be observed at FAIR.