Vortices versus monopoles in color confinement

TL;DR

This paper introduces a vortex creation operator in SU(2) gauge theory, demonstrating its role as a disorder parameter for deconfinement, and compares its behavior to monopoles, with results extrapolated to the thermodynamic limit.

Contribution

It develops a vortex creation operator in SU(2) gauge theory and analyzes its vacuum expectation value as a disorder parameter, extending monopole methods.

Findings

Vortex operator behaves similarly to monopoles in the vacuum.

Vacuum expectation value signals the deconfinement phase transition.

Finite-size scaling supports thermodynamic limit extrapolation.

Abstract

We construct the creation operator of a vortex for SU(2) pure gauge theory using the methods developed for monopoles. We interpret its vacuum expectation value as a disorder parameter for the deconfinement phase transition and find that it behaves in the vacuum in a similar way to monopoles. Results are extrapolated to the thermodynamical limit using finite-size scaling.