AG 1   Info

AG Audience

English

30 Minutes

Saarbrücken

Confinement denotes the empirical fact that at low temperature quarks and gluons cannot be observed in isolation. Instead, the constituents are always strongly bound to form composite objects, namely hadrons. However, high energy particle accelerator experiments as well as numerical simulations suggest that confinement breaks down once a certain critical temperature T_c is exceeded. Above this temperature hadrons dissolve into their constituents, which then form a plasma-like state of free quarks and gluons. We thus distinguish a low-temperature confined phase characterized by bound states and a high-temperature deconfined phase featuring a quark gluon plasma. Both phases are separated by a phase transition at T_c, the so-called deconfinement transition. Improving our understanding of the nature of confinement and its phase transition remains an important problem of modern-day theoretical and high energy experimental physics.

In this introductory talk I will discuss a theoretical framework suitable for the numerical study of confinement and the deconfinement transition. To this end I will introduce the basic notions of phase transitions and lattice gauge theory as well as associated Monte Carlo methods. Furthermore, I will present the classical picture of confinement and a novel approach based on clustering. In the end I will take a critical look at sample results.



The main goal of this talk is to give you an idea of how concepts of theoretical physics, numerical methods as well as concepts of computer science can join forces in order to shed light on a complex phenomenon observed in nature.

Rob van Stee

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