Confinement without symmetry breaking in chiral gauge theories

TL;DR

This paper explores the infrared behavior of chiral gauge theories, revealing a new phase with confinement but without symmetry breaking at large numbers of colors, using the functional renormalisation group.

Contribution

It demonstrates the existence of a confinement without symmetry breaking phase in chiral gauge theories, a novel regime not previously characterized.

Findings

Two distinct phases identified: confinement with symmetry breaking at small colors.

A new phase with confinement without symmetry breaking at large colors.

Potential for exotic spectra and phenomena in the new phase.

Abstract

The infrared structure of gauge theories with chiral fermions remains largely unexplored. In this work we investigate the Bars-Yankielowicz class using the functional renormalisation group, building on recent developments in gauge-fermion systems that provide clear criteria for confinement and dynamical symmetry breaking. We show that two distinct phases arise: one exhibiting both confinement and symmetry breaking at small numbers of colours, and another characterised by confinement without symmetry breaking in the large-colour limit. The latter realises a novel regime, opening the possibility of exotic spectra and phenomena that can now be studied within a systematic framework.