Casimir Effect in Yang-Mills Theory in D=2+1

M.N. Chernodub (1) , V.A. Goy , A.V. Molochkov , Ha Huu Nguyen (1)

1 IDP - Institut Denis Poisson

We study, for the first time, the Casimir effect in non-Abelian gauge theory using first-principles numerical simulations. Working in two spatial dimensions at zero temperature, we find that closely spaced perfect chromoelectric conductors attract each other with a small anomalous scaling dimension. At large separation between the conductors, the attraction is exponentially suppressed by a new massive quantity, the Casimir mass, which is surprisingly different from the lowest glueball mass. The apparent emergence of the new massive scale may be a result of the backreaction of the vacuum to the presence of the plates as sufficiently close chromoelectric conductors induce, in a space between them, a smooth crossover transition to a color deconfinement phase.

Mots clés: Elementary Particles and Fields; effect: Casimir; gauge field theory: Yang-Mills; gauge field theory: nonabelian; gauge field theory: SU(2); space-time: dimension: 3; scaling: dimension; temperature: 0; glueball: mass; chromoelectric; numerical calculations; back reaction; deconfinement; suppression

Domaines: Physique des Hautes Energies - Réseau [hep-lat]; Physique des Hautes Energies - Théorie [hep-th]; Physique Générale [physics.gen-ph]

M.N. Chernodub, V.A. Goy, A.V. Molochkov, Ha Huu Nguyen. Casimir Effect in Yang-Mills Theory in D=2+1. Physical Review Letters, 2018, 121 (19), pp.191601. ⟨10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.191601⟩. ⟨hal-01815174⟩