# Thermal Heavy Quark Self-Energy from Euclidean Correlators

## TL;DR

This paper links the real self-energy of a single heavy quark to Euclidean electric field correlators along a Polyakov line, enabling lattice studies without analytical continuation, and compares Minkowski and Euclidean calculations.

## Contribution

It identifies a real self-energy term for open heavy flavor and expresses it via Euclidean correlators, expanding the understanding of heavy quark self-energies.

## Key findings

- The self-energy term can be directly computed from Euclidean correlators.
- Minkowski and Euclidean correlators are consistent at NLO.
- The self-energy for open heavy flavor differs from that of quarkonium.

## Abstract

Brambilla, Escobedo, Soto, and Vairo have derived an effective description of quarkonium with two parameters; a momentum diffusion term and a real self-energy term. We point out that there is a similar real self-energy term for a single open heavy flavor and that it can be expressed directly in terms of Euclidean electric field correlators along a Polyakov line. This quantity can be directly studied on the lattice without the need for analytical continuation. We show that Minkowski-space calculations of this correlator correspond with the known NLO Euclidean value of the relevant electric field two-point function and that it differs from the real self-energy term for quarkonium.