Single-flavour and two-flavour pairing in three-flavour quark matter
Abstract
We study single-flavour quark pairing ('self-pairing') in colour-superconducting phases of quark matter, paying particular attention to the difference between scenarios where all three flavours undergo single-flavour pairing, and scenarios where two flavours pair with each other ('2SC' pairing) and the remaining flavour self-pairs. We perform our calculations in the mean-field approximation using a pointlike four-fermion interaction based on single gluon exchange. We confirm the result from previous weakly-coupled-QCD calculations that when all three flavours self-pair the favoured channel for each is colour-spin-locked (CSL) pseudoisotropic pairing. However, we find that when the up and down quarks undergo 2SC pairing, they induce a colour chemical potential that disfavours the CSL phase. The strange quarks then self-pair in a 'polar' channel that breaks rotational invariance, although the CSL phase may survive in a narrow range of densities.
- Publication:
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Journal of Physics G Nuclear Physics
- Pub Date:
- April 2006
- DOI:
- 10.1088/0954-3899/32/4/009
- arXiv:
- arXiv:hep-ph/0512104
- Bibcode:
- 2006JPhG...32..511A
- Keywords:
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- High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
- E-Print:
- 12 pages, RevTeX