Gluon knots as the dynamical core of baryons

TL;DR

This paper proposes that gluon knots, topologically nontrivial configurations of color-magnetic monopole condensates, form the core of baryons, linking confinement, chiral symmetry breaking, and internal hadron dynamics in a unified topological framework.

Contribution

It introduces a novel topological model where gluon knots serve as the dynamical core of baryons, connecting confinement and chiral symmetry breaking.

Findings

Gluon knots induce flux tubes leading to quark confinement.

Color-magnetic fields from gluon knots contribute to chiral condensate formation.

The model suggests a unified topological picture for baryons and some mesons.

Abstract

We propose a conjectural picture of baryon structure in which gluon knots, a type of topologically nontrivial configuration of color--magnetic monopole condensates, forms the dynamical core of the baryon. Within this framework, quarks interact with the gluon knot via abelian-dominated color-electric fields, which are squeezed into flux tubes by the dual Meissner effect, leading naturally to quark confinement. The color--magnetic fields associated with the gluon knot also induce a local chiral condensate, contributing to spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking and the baryon mass. Extending this conjecture to heavy-flavor mesons, we argue that stable flux tubes and gluon knots may also play a role in their internal structure, whereas light-flavor mesons are dominated by alternative confinement mechanisms. Our approach provides a unified, topologically motivated picture linking confinement, chiral symmetry breaking, and the internal dynamics of baryons and certain mesons, suggesting that gluon knots constitute fundamental infrared degrees of freedom of Yang--Mills theory.