The cool potential of gluons

TL;DR

This paper proposes that a dense, gluon-rich state called 'serried glue' could exist below the typical confinement temperature, potentially altering our understanding of quark-gluon plasma formation.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of 'serried glue', a novel state of over-occupied gluons with effective mass and positive chemical potential, expanding the theoretical landscape of quark-gluon plasma phases.

Findings

Gluons can behave as non-relativistic bosons with positive chemical potential.

Dense gluon states may exist below the confinement temperature.

Properties of 'serried glue' can be inferred from Maxwell's relations.

Abstract

We put forward the idea that the quark-gluon plasma might exist way below the usual confinement temperature $T_c$. Our argument rests on the possibility that the plasma produced in heavy-ion collisions could reach a transient quasi-equilibrium with `over-occupied' gluon density, as advocated by Blaizot et al. Taking further into account that gluons acquire an effective mass by interaction effects, they can have a positive chemical potential and therefore behave similarly to non-relativistic bosons. Relevant properties of this dense state of interacting gluons, which we dub serried glue, can then be inferred on rather general grounds from Maxwell's relation.