New findings for topological excitations in SU(3) lattice gauge theory

TL;DR

This paper investigates the structure of topological excitations in SU(3) lattice gauge theory by analyzing Dirac eigenvectors with varying boundary conditions, revealing complex monopole-like configurations near the QCD phase transition.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the topological structure of the SU(3) vacuum, especially the behavior of zero-modes and their relation to monopole constituents near T_c and on the torus.

Findings

Zero-mode position varies with boundary phase.

Topological charge |Q|=1 configurations consist of multiple lumps.

Results resemble Kraan-van Baal monopole solutions.

Abstract

We probe the SU(3) vacuum using eigenvectors of the Dirac operator with an arbitrary phase for the temporal boundary condition. We consider configurations with topological charge |Q| = 1 near the QCD phase transition and at low temperatures on a torus. For all our ensembles we show that the zero-mode of the Dirac operator changes its position as one changes the phase of the boundary condition. For ensembles near the QCD phase transition our results closely resemble the behavior of zero-modes for Kraan - van Baal solutions of the classical Yang-Mills equations where the individual lumps are interpreted as monopoles. Our findings near T_c and on the torus show that for both cases an excitation with topological charge |Q| = 1 is built from several separate lumps.