Wilson Loop, Regge Trajectory and Hadron Masses in a Yang-Mills Theory from Semiclassical Strings

TL;DR

This paper calculates one-loop string corrections in a non-supersymmetric Yang-Mills model, revealing modifications to Wilson loops, glueball trajectories, and hadron spectra that align with experimental observations and universality classes.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed one-loop string correction analysis for Wilson loops, glueball Regge trajectories, and hadron masses in a holographic Yang-Mills framework, highlighting their nonlinearities and spectrum predictions.

Findings

String corrections rescale the field theory string tension.

Glueball Regge trajectories become nonlinear with positive intercepts.

Predicted hadron spectrum falls into known universality classes.

Abstract

We compute the one-loop string corrections to the Wilson loop, glueball Regge trajectory and stringy hadron masses in the Witten model of non supersymmetric, large-N Yang-Mills theory. The classical string configurations corresponding to the above field theory objects are respectively: open straight strings, folded closed spinning strings, and strings orbiting in the internal part of the supergravity background. For the rectangular Wilson loop we show that besides the standard Luescher term, string corrections provide a rescaling of the field theory string tension. The one-loop corrections to the linear glueball Regge trajectories render them nonlinear with a positive intercept, as in the experimental soft Pomeron trajectory. Strings orbiting in the internal space predict a spectrum of hadronic-like states charged under global flavor symmetries which falls in the same universality class of other confining models.