Related papers: Fluctuations in cool quark matter and the phase di…
The phase structure of baryonic matter is investigated with focus on the role of fluctuations beyond the mean-field approximation. The prototype test case studied is the chiral nucleon-meson model, with added comments on the chiral…
A variety of analytical techniques suggest that quantum fluctuations lead to a fundamental instability of the Fermi liquid that drives ferromagnetic transitions first order at low temperatures. We present both analytical and numerical…
We study the thermodynamics of the linear sigma model with constituent quarks beyond the mean-field approximation. By integrating out the quark degrees of freedom we derive an effective action for the meson fields which is then linearized…
We give an elementary and pedagogical review of the phase diagrams which are possible in Quantum ChromoDynamics (QCD). Currently, the emphasis is upon the appearance of a critical endpoint, where disordered and ordered phases meet. In many…
The chiral condensate, which is constant in vacuum, may become spatially modulated at moderately high densities where in the traditional picture of the QCD phase diagram a first-order chiral phase transition occurs. We review the current…
We show that large fluctuations of D mesons kinetic energy (or momentum) distributions might be a signature of a phase transition to the quark gluon plasma (QGP). In particular, a jump in the variance of the momenta or kinetic energy, as a…
We have studied the grand potential and phase transitions of an inhomogeneous finite volume spherical quark system. First the finite volume effects are considered by applying the multiple reflection expansion method which is an…
We investigate properties of strongly interacting matter in a schematic model, based on the combined degrees of freedom of a non-interacting hadronic phase and a non-interacting deconfined phase. It is found that in a finite system both…
In this talk I discuss how a first order phase transition may proceed in rapidly expanding partonic matter produced in a relativistic heavy-ion collision. The resulting picture is that a strong collective flow of matter will lead to the…
Quantum phase transitions have been the subject of intense investigations in the last two decades [1]. Among other problems, these phase transitions are relevant in the study of heavy fermion systems, high temperature superconductors and…
We study the phase diagram of quark matter at finite temperature (T) and finite chemical potential (mu) in the strong coupling limit of lattice QCD for color SU(3). We derive an analytical expression of the effective free energy as a…
We study a $U(N)\times U(N)$ symmetric scalar field model in four and three dimensions. First, using our data in four dimensions in the weak coupling region, we demonstrate explicitly that the observed first order phase transition is…
Non-equilibrium features of a first order phase transition from the quark-gluon plasma to a hadronic gas in relativistic heavy-ion collisions are discussed. It is demonstrated that strong collective expansion may lead to the fragmentation…
Chiral pair fluctuation are considered near the phase boundary of the inhomogeneous chiral phase (iCP). The fluctuations are then bosonized and an effective action for the chiral pair fluctuation is basically constructed by considering the…
We investigate the process of phase conversion in a thermally-driven {\it weakly} first-order quark-hadron transition. This scenario is physically appealing even if the nature of this transition in equilibrium proves to be a smooth…
The region of large net-baryon densities in the QCD phase diagram is expected to exhibit a first-order phase transition. Experimentally, its study will be one of the primaryobjectives for the upcoming FAIR accelerator. We model the…
A survey is given of recent QCD theory advances concerning the phase diagram, in particular the indications for a critical point and adjacent first order phase transition at high baryo-chemical potential, and the new ideas concerning a…
We study the effects of thermal fluctuations of gluons and the diquark pairing field on the superconducting-to-normal state phase transition in a three-flavor color superconductor, using the Ginzburg-Landau free energy. At high baryon…
A comprehensive theory of the quantum phase transition in clean, itinerant Heisenberg ferromagnets is presented. It is shown that the standard mean-field description of the transition is invalid in spatial dimensions $d\leq 3$ due to the…
Studies of the QCD phase diagram must properly include nucleonic degrees of freedom and their thermodynamics in the range of baryon chemical potentials characteristic of nuclear matter. A useful framework for incorporating relevant nuclear…