Wilson loops from multicenter and rotating branes, mass gaps and phase structure in gauge theories
Jun, 199927 pages
Published in:
- Adv.Theor.Math.Phys. 3 (1999) 851-887
e-Print:
- hep-th/9906201 [hep-th]
Report number:
- CERN-TH-99-191
Citations per year
Abstract:
Within the AdS/CFT correspondence we use multicentre D3-brane metrics to investigate Wilson loops and compute the associated heavy quark-antiquark potentials for the strongly coupled SU(N) super-Yang-Mills gauge theory, when the gauge symmetry is broken by the expectation values of the scalar fields. For the case of a uniform distribution of D3-branes over a disc, we find that there exists a maximum separation beyond which there is no force between the quark and the antiquark, i.e. the screening is complete. We associate this phenomenon with the possible existence of a mass gap in the strongly coupled gauge theory. In the finite-temperature case, when the corresponding supergravity solution is a rotating D3-brane solution, there is a class of potentials interpolating between a Coulombic and a confining behaviour. However, above a certain critical value of the mass parameter, the potentials exhibit a behaviour characteristic of statistical systems undergoing phase transitions. The physical path preserves the concavity property of the potential and minimizes the energy. Using the same rotating-brane solutions, we also compute spatial Wilson loops, associated with the quark-antiquark potential in models of three-dimensional gauge theories at zero temperature, with similar results.Note:
- 27 pages, latex, 7 figures; v2: no substantial changes, version to appear in Adv. Theor. Math. Phys Report-no: CERN-TH/99-191
- field theory: anti-de Sitter
- field theory: conformal
- membrane model: D-brane
- membrane model: p-brane
- p-brane: 3
- gauge field theory: SU(N)
- supersymmetry
- Wilson loop
- quark antiquark: potential
- approximation: strong coupling
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