QCD thermodynamics with three flavors of improved staggered quarks

C. Bernard, T. Burch, C. DeTar, J. Osborn, Steven Gottlieb, E. B. Gregory, D. Toussaint, U. M. Heller, and R. Sugar
Phys. Rev. D 71, 034504 – Published 14 February 2005

Abstract

We report on a study of QCD thermodynamics with three flavors of quarks, using a Symanzik improved gauge action and the Asqtad O(a2) improved staggered quark action. Simulations were carried out with lattice spacings 1/4T, 1/6T, and 1/8T both for three degenerate quarks with masses less than or equal to the strange quark mass ms and for degenerate up and down quarks with masses in the range 0.1msmu,d0.6ms and the strange quark mass fixed near its physical value. We present results for standard thermodynamics quantities, such as the Polyakov loop, the chiral order parameter and its susceptibility. For the quark masses studied to date we find a rapid crossover rather than a bona fide phase transition. We have carried out the first calculations of quark number susceptibilities with three flavors of sea quarks. These quantities are of physical interest because they are related to event-by-event fluctuations in heavy ion collision experiments. Comparison of susceptibilities at different lattice spacings show that our results are close to the continuum values.

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  • Received 1 December 2004

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.71.034504

©2005 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

C. Bernard

  • Department of Physics, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA

T. Burch

  • Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Regensburg, D-93040 Regensburg, Germany

C. DeTar and J. Osborn

  • Physics Department, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112, USA

Steven Gottlieb

  • Department of Physics, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana 47405, USA

E. B. Gregory and D. Toussaint

  • Department of Physics, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA

U. M. Heller

  • American Physical Society, One Research Road, Box 9000, Ridge, New York 11961-9000, USA

R. Sugar

  • Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA

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Vol. 71, Iss. 3 — 1 February 2005

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