The Mixed Non-Abelian Coulomb Gas in Two Dimensions

TL;DR

This paper studies the phase transitions in a 2D U(N) gauge theory with mixed adjoint and fundamental charges, revealing a change from first to third order deconfinement transitions as charge densities vary.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of the phase structure of a mixed non-Abelian Coulomb gas in two dimensions, highlighting the order change in phase transitions with varying charge densities.

Findings

First order deconfining transition at low fundamental charge density

Transition becomes third order as fundamental charge density increases

Phase diagram characterized by changing transition orders

Abstract

The statistical mechanics of a mixed gas of adjoint and fundamental representation charges interacting via 1+1-dimensional U(N) gauge fields is investigated. In the limit of large N we show that there is a first order deconfining phase transition for low densities of fundamental charges. As the density of fundamental charges becomes comparable to the adjoint charge density the phase transition becomes a third order one.