Abelian monopole and vortex condensation in lattice gauge theories

We study abelian monopole and vortex condensation in lattice pure gauge theories. Condensation is detected by means of a disorder parameter defined in terms of a gauge-invariant effective action introduced using the lattice Schrödinger functional. Dirac monopoles condense in the confined phase of U(1) lattice gauge theory. Abelian monopoles and abelian vortices condense in the confined phase of SU(2) and SU(3) lattice gauge theories.