Systematics of the Light and Strange Baryons and the Symmetries of QCD

TL;DR

This paper models the spectra of light and strange baryons using a harmonic confinement potential and SU(3) flavor symmetry, revealing the role of chiral symmetry and predicting baryon masses with high accuracy.

Contribution

It introduces a unified framework combining harmonic confinement and SU(3) flavor symmetry to accurately describe baryon spectra and their multiplet structures.

Findings

Spectrum described by multiplets of SU(6)_{FS}×U(6)_{conf}

Mass predictions with approximately 5% accuracy

Spectrum formation influenced by octet-mediated interactions

Abstract

The spectra of the nucleons and the strange hyperons are well described by a harmonic confinement potential for the constituent quarks and an SU(3) flavor-symmetric interaction mediated by the pseudoscalar octet that is associated with the hidden approximate chiral symmetry of QCD. The spectrum is formed of multiplets of $SU(6)_{FS}\times U(6)_{conf}$, which are mixed by the octet interaction. With 4 matrix elements of the octet mediated interaction determined by the lowest mass splittings in the nucleon spectrum the resulting mass formula predicts the whole spectrum with an accuracy of $\sim$ 5\%.