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# Transition from Knudsen to molecular diffusion in activity of absorbing irregular interfaces

## Abstract

We investigate through molecular dynamics the transition from Knudsen to molecular diffusion transport towards $`2d`$ absorbing interfaces with irregular geometry. Our results indicate that the length of the active zone decreases continuously with density from the Knudsen to the molecular diffusion regime. In the limit where molecular diffusion dominates, we find that this length approaches a constant value of the order of the system size, in agreement with theoretical predictions for Laplacian transport in irregular geometries. Finally, we show that all these features can be qualitatively described in terms of a simple random-walk model of the diffusion process.

The problem of Laplacian transport towards irregular surfaces represents an important subject of research in many fields of technological relevance including heterogeneous catalysis, heat transfer and electrochemistry. In the particular case of catalysis, the role of the local surface morphology at the pore level on the global diffusion-reaction efficiency of the catalyst has been a subject of great interest in the past years . Fractal concepts have been used to model complex surface roughness in the study of Knudsen diffusion in irregular reactive pores  including catalyst supports and adsorbents .

Another interesting point on the subject refers to the problem of the nonuniform accessibility of active sites located along an irregular reactive surface. If the system is diffusion-controlled, these so-called screening effects may cause a dramatic reduction on the reactivity of the catalyst surface, as compared to the reactivity solely due to the intrinsic chemical reaction mechanism (i.e., the activity of the nominal surface). The extensive research developed on this field has been mainly devoted to the introduction, calculation and application of the concept of active zone in the Laplacian transport to and across irregular interfaces . For example, through the coarse-graining method proposed in , it is possible to determine the flux through an arbitrarily irregular surface from its geometry alone, avoiding the solution of the Laplace problem within a complex boundary domain. More recently, it has been shown that this technique provides consistent predictions for the activity of catalyst surfaces .

All these studies dealing with active zone in Laplacian fields rely on the implicit assumption that molecular diffusion is the governing mechanism of mass transport. Such an approximation, however, can only be locally valid inside of the void space between the fins or extended protrusions of an irregular surface if the mean free path of the diffusing molecules is sufficiently smaller than the width of these irregularities. For example, Knudsen diffusion may become the dominant mechanism of mass transport determining the reactivity of the system if the reagent is a diluted gas for which the collisions among molecules are less frequent than the collisions between the molecules and the catalytic surface . The molecular mean free path therefore constitutes a lower cut-off for the validity of the molecular diffusion description. In a recent study , it has been shown analytically and through numerical simulations that surface roughness can have a significant effect on self-diffusion of gases in nanoporous media in the Knudsen regime.

The aim of the present Letter is to study the transition in activity of an irregular absorbing interface when the mechanism of mass transport changes from Knudsen to molecular diffusion. Our approach is to use a nonequilibrium molecular dynamics (NMD) technique in order to simulate a nonuniform and steady-state profile of reagent concentration between two active interfaces with an arbitrarily given roughness. This resembles more closely the experimental conditions frequently used in diffusion-reaction measurements. Here we adopt an NMD method that has been originally proposed for the study of self-diffusion in pure fluids . The technique is entirely based on the standard molecular dynamics (MD) at equilibrium, but includes a special scheme to identify and exchange labeled and unlabeled particles during the simulation.

The MD part of the simulation consists in a two-dimensional cell of size $`L_xl\times L_yl`$ containing $`N`$ identical particles that interact through the Lennard-Jones potential, $`\mathrm{\Phi }(\mathrm{\Delta }r_{ij})=4ϵ[(\sigma /\mathrm{\Delta }r_{ij})^{12}(\sigma /\mathrm{\Delta }r_{ij})^6]`$, where $`\mathrm{\Delta }r_{ij}`$ is the distance between particles $`i`$ and $`j`$, $`ϵ`$ is the minimum energy, $`\sigma `$ is the zero of the potential, and we use $`l/\sigma =5.86`$. Periodic boundary conditions are applied in both the $`x`$ and $`y`$ directions. Distance, energy and time are measured in units of $`\sigma `$, $`ϵ`$ and $`(m\sigma ^2/ϵ)^{1/2}`$, respectively, and the equations of motion are numerically integrated using the Verlet algorithm . In all simulations we performed, the relative fluctuation around the average of the total energy of the system has always been smaller than $`10^4`$.

After thermalization, two identical fractal interfaces of size $`L_yl`$ and perimeter $`L_pl`$ are symmetrically placed into the system to simulate the roughness geometry of an absorbing material (see Fig. 1). At this point, the non-equilibrium dynamics is put forward through the following scheme: (1) half of the particles in the MD cell are randomly selected to carry a label, while the other half are left unlabeled; (2) every time a labeled (unlabeled) particle crosses the interface at right (left) moving in the $`\stackrel{}{e_x}`$ ($`\stackrel{}{e_x}`$) direction it becomes unlabeled (labeled), and (3) when reinjected to the right (left) through the periodic boundaries in the $`x`$ axis, an unlabeled (labeled) particle becomes labeled (unlabeled). Although the particles are indistinguishable in terms of their mass and interaction potential, this labeling technique naturally builds concentration gradients for both “species” that gradually develop to reach a desired non-uniform steady-state. In Fig. 1 we show the resulting stationary profiles along the $`x`$ coordinate of the number fractions $`\theta _ln_l/(n_l+n_u)`$ and $`\theta _u=1\theta _l`$, where $`n_l`$ and $`n_u`$ are the number of labeled and unlabeled particles, respectively, inside a vertical slice of fixed length in the system. From this point on during the simulation, we keep updating at each time step the number $`n_i`$ of particles being “absorbed” by the element $`i`$ of the interface in order to compute its local mass flux $`q_i=n_i/\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, where $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is the elapsed time after the steady-state has been established. Here we measure the efficiency of the interface in terms of the active length $`L_a`$ defined as

$$L_a1/\underset{i=1}{\overset{L_p}{}}\varphi _i^2(1L_aL_p),$$
(1)
where the sum is over the total number of interface elements $`L_p`$, and $`\varphi _iq_i/q_j`$ is the normalized mass flux at element $`i`$. From the definition (1), $`L_a=L_p`$ indicates a limiting state of equal partition of fluxes ($`\varphi _i=1/L_p`$, $`i`$) whereas $`L_a`$ of order $`L_y`$ should correspond to the case of an strongly “localized” flux distribution.

Based on this NMD method, we performed simulations for 5 distinct initial configurations of the dynamical system, different values of the reduced temperature $`T`$, and reduced densities in the range $`0.025\rho 0.5`$, corresponding to systems with $`N=1250`$ to $`25000`$ particles. The evolution with time of the active length for any NMD realization reveals that, after a transient period, the system reaches a stationary state characterized by an average value of $`L_a`$ that is representative of the flux distribution. As shown in Fig. 2, the active length decreases sharply with $`\rho `$ for low density systems at $`T=1.25`$, up to a point where it remains constant at $`L_a27`$. The results from simulations performed at a higher temperature, $`T=3.33`$, show that the behavior of the active length remains nearly the same, at least within the range of densities considered here.

The decrease with density of the active length $`L_a`$ reflects the transition from Knudsen to molecular diffusion in the distribution of activity at the interface. Because the mean free path of the particles for small $`\rho `$ values is larger than the smaller length scale $`l`$ of the irregular interface, the activity is highly sensitive to geometrical constraints in the Knudsen regime. As shown in the inset of Fig. 2, the difference in behavior of the pair-correlation function for dilute and more dense fluids indicates that the simulated system undergoes noticeable structural modifications as $`\rho `$ increases.

At higher densities, the invariant behavior of $`L_a`$ is a consequence of molecular diffusion and can be explained in terms of an interesting theorem given by Makarov  to describe the properties of Laplacian fields on two-dimensional interfaces of arbitrary shape subjected to Dirichlet boundary conditions. The theorem states that the information dimension of the harmonic measure on a singly connected interface in $`d=2`$ is exactly equal to 1. In terms of activity, this means that, regardless the shape of the interface, the total length $`L_a`$ of the region where most of the activity takes place should be of the order of the size $`L`$ of the cell under a dilation transformation (see Ref.  for a detailed discussion of the active zone concept). Translating to our diffusion cell, where square Koch trees of third generation are the absorbing interfaces, the theorem of Makarov predicts that the value of $`L_a`$ should be close to the size $`L_y=27`$, in good agreement with the NMD limit obtained for high densities.

One can compute directly the length of the active zone for the two-dimensional continuum Laplacian problem which represents steady-state diffusion . Numerical solutions of the Laplace equation, $`^2C=0`$, for the concentration field $`C`$ inside the diffusion cell are obtained here through numerical discretization by means of finite-differences. For this, a constant unitary concentration is imposed at the source line ($`C_0=1`$) and Dirichlet boundary conditions ($`C=0`$) are assigned to each elementary unit of the interface. Due to the symmetry with respect to the source line, only the concentration field in half of the domain needs to be calculated. The calculated value for the active length of the purely Laplacian cell is found to be $`L_a=22.9`$, compatible with the prediction of the Makarov theorem, $`L_aL_y`$.

Now we show that a simple random-walk model of the diffusion-absorption process can provide a consistent qualitative description of the behavior observed in the NMD simulations. Adopting the same geometry, a particle is released from a random position in the center line. The walker travels through the medium taking steps of random directions, but constant length $`\lambda `$, till it crosses one of the wall elements of the fractal interface and gets absorbed. The flux at this element is then updated and the active length $`L_a`$ of the interface recalculated. For a fixed value of the step length $`\lambda `$, the simulation goes on with particles being sequentially released and absorbed, till the active length reaches an average value that is approximately constant. This value is usually obtained with less than $`10^5`$ particles launched in the system. In Fig. 3 we show the dependence on the parameter $`\xi (\sigma /\lambda )`$ of the average $`L_a`$ computed for the third generation of the square Koch tree. For a two-dimensional gas, $`\lambda `$ can be interpreted as the mean free path, which is inversely proportional to the surface density of the system, $`\lambda 1/\rho `$. Similarly to the NMD simulations, two distinct regimes of activity can be clearly identified and directly related to the different governing mechanisms of mass transport, namely, Knudsen and molecular diffusion. At low values of $`\xi `$, the sharp decrease of $`L_a`$ reflects the strong influence on the mass transport process of the fractal geometry of the interface. The semi-log plot shown in the inset of Fig. 3 indicates that this decay in activity characterizing the Knudsen regime is approximately logarithmic in shape.

At sufficiently large values of $`\xi `$, the length $`L_a`$ reaches a plateau of minimum activity that is practically coincident with the value of the active length found for the Laplacian cell, $`L_a=22.9`$ (dashed line at the bottom in Fig. 3). It is important to show that these two approaches to the problem provide consistent results for denser systems, even at the local scale of the interface geometry. Indeed, as displayed in Fig. 4, the normalized fluxes at each wall element generated from the continuum and random-walk methods are almost indistinguishable. Compared to the lower limit of the random-walk model, $`L_a24`$, the higher value found for the active length with the NMD technique, $`L_a27`$, can be explained in terms of the structural features of the simulated fluid. As shown in the inset of Fig. 2, the role of the attractive part of the interaction potential is to induce a smooth peak of short-range correlation that characterizes the presence of small particle clusters in the fluid. This geometrical aspect of the NMD system tends to increase the measure of the active length of the absorbing interface.

In conclusion, we have shown through molecular dynamics simulations that the active fraction of an irregular absorbing interface should be sensitive to: (i) its geometrical details; (ii) the governing mechanism of transport, and (iii) the structural aspects of the diffusing fluid. In particular, the active length for absorption of molecular diffusing fluids is found to be very close to that of a purely Laplacian system. These observations may lead to new guidelines to the problem of diffusion and absorption on arbitrarily irregular interfaces. Furthermore, we have proposed a very simple random-walk model that incorporates the basic features of the diffusion-absorption process and is capable to describe, at least semi-quantitatively, the behavior of the active length for different diffusion regimes. This model provides substantial insight on the effect of the diffusion mechanism on the interface activity and has the virtue of being computationally cheap. Finally, the approach introduced here is flexible enough to represent specific characteristics of irregular interfaces as well as other types of “absorption” mechanisms (e.g., finite-rate chemical reactions) limited by diffusion transport. As a consequence, the implications of this study are certainly relevant for the analysis and interpretation of diffusion and reaction processes occurring in a large variety of catalyst materials. The modeling techniques we adopted should also be useful as design tools to choose a suitable catalytic interface for a given reaction-diffusion system.

We thank CNPq, CAPES, COFECUB and FUNCAP for support. The Centre de Mathématiques et de leurs Applications and the Laboratoire de Physique de la Matière Condensée are “Unité Mixte de Recherches du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique” no. 8536 and 7643.


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# Observation of a baryon resonance with positive strangeness in 𝐾⁺ collisions with Xe nuclei11footnote 1Based on a talk at Session of Nuclear Division of Russian Academy of Sciences, Dec. 3, 2002. Published in Yad. Fiz. 66, 1763-1766 (2003); Phys. At. Nucl. 66, 1715–1718 (2003).

## Abstract

The status of our investigation of low-energy $`K^+`$Xe collisions in the Xenon bubble chamber DIANA is reported. In the charge-exchange reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$, the spectrum of $`K^0p`$ effective mass shows a resonant enhancement with $`M=1539\pm 2`$ MeV/c2 and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }9`$ MeV/c2. The statistical significance of the enhancement is near $`4.4\sigma `$. The mass and width of the observed resonance are consistent with expectations for the lightest member of the anti-decuplet of exotic pentaquark baryons, as predicted in the framework of the chiral soliton model.

This paper reports an investigation of low-energy $`K^+`$–nucleus collisions aimed at testing the hypothesis of an anti-decuplet of exotic pentaquark baryons, as proposed by Diakonov, Petrov and Polyakov  in the framework of the chiral soliton model. Assuming that the known nucleon resonance $`P_{11}(1710)`$ belongs to the hypothesized anti-decuplet, predictions for the masses and decay widths of its other members have been obtained . Of these, the lightest is the exotic pentaquark state $`uudd\overline{s}`$ with mass near 1530 MeV/c2 and decay width $`\mathrm{\Gamma }<15`$ MeV/c2. This spin-1/2 isospin-zero state with positive strangeness, referred to as the $`Z^+`$ baryon, is expected to decay to $`K^0p`$ and $`K^+n`$.

Two different methods may be employed when searching for formation of the $`Z^+`$ baryon in $`K^+`$Xe collisions. The first and straightforward approach is to analyze the effective mass of the $`K^0p`$ system in the reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$ for the $`Z^+`$ peak near 1530 MeV/c2. The second approach is to measure the cross sections for formation of the final states $`K^0p`$ and $`K^+n`$ as functions of $`K^+`$ momentum. Given a target nucleon bound in the Xe nucleus, formation of the $`Z^+`$ baryon should manifest itself as an enhancement of partial cross sections of elementary processes $`K^+nK^+n`$ and $`K^+nK^0p`$ at $`K^+`$ momentum near 480 MeV/c. Measurements of these partial cross sections in the interval $`400<P_{K^+}<700`$ MeV/c are in progress, and should finally reach a statistical accuracy of (3–6)% with $`K^+`$ momentum pitch of 30–40 MeV/c. The latter measurements are also important for clarifying some problems arising in the analysis of low-energy $`K^+`$–nucleus collisions .

The bubble chamber DIANA filled with liquid Xenon has been exposed to a separated $`K^+`$ beam with momentum of 850 MeV/c from the ITEP proton synchrotron. The density and radiation length of the fill are 2.2 g/cm3 and 3.7 cm, respectively. The chamber has a total volume of $`70\times 70\times 140`$ cm3 viewed by photographic cameras, and operates without magnetic field . Charged particles are identified by ionization and momentum-analyzed by range in Xenon. On total, some $`10^6`$ tracks of incident $`K^+`$ mesons are recorded on film. A half of collected film has been scanned, and nearly 25 000 events with visible $`K^0`$ decays, $`K_S^0\pi ^+\pi ^{}`$ and $`K_S^0\pi ^0\pi ^0`$, have been found.

In the fiducial volume of the bubble chamber, $`K^+`$ momentum is a function of longitudinal coordinate and varies from 750 MeV/c for entering kaons to zero for those that range out through ionization. (A 150-mm-thick layer of Xenon downstream of the front wall is beyond the selected fiducial volume, and is only used for detecting the secondaries that travel in the backward hemisphere.) Throughout this interval of $`K^+`$ momentum, partial cross sections for formation of various final states of $`K^+`$Xe collisions can be measured thanks to efficient detection of either the decays and interactions of incident kaons in the Xenon bubble chamber. The momentum of an interacting $`K^+`$ is determined from the longitudinal coordinate of interaction vertex with respect to central position of the observed maximum due to decays of stopping $`K^+`$ mesons. The uncertainty on $`K^+`$ momentum is near 20 MeV/c for $`P_{K^+}`$ in the range of $`500\pm 50`$ MeV/c.

The methodology of this work is illustrated by Fig. 1 where measured $`K^+`$ range before interaction or decay is plotted for different event categories (the upper scale shows corresponding $`K^+`$ momentum). These data are based on a throughput measurement of 41 thousand tracks of incident kaons. The distribution of all incident $`K^+`$ mesons in track length is shown in Fig. 1a, and of those $`K^+`$ mesons that have decayed either in flight or at rest—in Fig. 1b. The enhancement near 945 mm is due to decays of stopping kaons. All $`K^+`$ decays have been uniquely identified in the bubble chamber, and observed branching fractions are in agreement with tabulated values. The distribution of selected events of the charge-exchange reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0X`$ is illustrated in Fig. 1c. This includes the events with either a $`K_S^0`$ detected by decay to $`\pi ^0\pi ^0`$ or $`\pi ^+\pi ^{}`$, and a $`K_L^0`$ whose presence is inferred from non-observation of strange particles in the final state222Note that of some 6300 events in the latter distribution, $`3100`$ are part of the aforementioned subsample of $`25000`$ events with detected $`K_S^0`$ decays. Measuring $`K^+`$ track length in all such events will significantly increase the statistics of the charge-exchange reaction.. Apart from $`K^+`$ decays and the charge-exchange reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0X`$, the inclusive distribution of Fig. 1a picks contributions from elementary scattering processes $`K^+nK^+n`$ and $`K^+pK^+p`$ and from electromagnetic interactions with Coulomb field of the Xe nucleus. The extraction of corresponding partial cross sections is in progress. As indicated above, comparing the partial cross sections of elementary reactions $`K^+nK^+n`$, $`K^+nK^0p`$, and $`K^+pK^+p`$ as functions of $`K^+`$ momentum may provide a clue to formation of the hypothesized $`Z^+`$ baryon in $`K^+`$Xe collisions.

In this paper we adopt an alternative approach that consists in analyzing the $`K^0p`$ effective mass in the charge-exchange reaction $`K^+nK^0p`$ on a bound nucleon. The events of this reaction are fully measured and reconstructed in space using specially designed stereo-projectors similar to those proposed in . Of the $`25000`$ events with visible $`K_S^0`$ decays, selected for complete reconstruction are those with a single proton and a $`K_S^0\pi ^+\pi ^{}`$ candidate in the final state. The distance between the primary and $`K^0`$ vertices is required to exceed 2.5 mm. In a selected event, we measure the $`K_S^0`$ and proton emission angles with respect to the $`K^+`$ direction, $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$ emission angles with respect to the parent $`K_S^0`$ direction, and proton and pion paths in Xenon. The momentum is estimated by range for the proton, and by pion ranges and emission angles for the $`K_S^0`$. Proton and $`K_S^0`$ momenta are required to exceed 180 and 170 MeV/c, respectively. Further details on the experimental procedure can be found in .

In order to reduce the total volume of measurements, $`K^+`$ range before interaction is required to exceed 550 mm. On average, this corresponds to the selection $`P_{K^+}<530`$ MeV/c 333Mean momentum of incident $`K^+`$ beam varied by some $`\pm 15`$ MeV/c in different exposures.. The distribution of measured events of the reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$ in $`P_{K^+}`$ is shown in Fig. 2. The mean value of $`K^+`$ momentum is close to 470 MeV/c. By now, we have fully measured 1112 events of the charge-exchange reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$; measuring all selected events will nearly double the available statistics of this reaction.

In order to estimate the uncertainty on effective mass of the $`K^0p`$ system, we invoke our earlier measurements  of two-prong secondary vertices (or Vees) formed by a proton and a charged pion, that relied on same techniques. The distribution of effective mass of such Vees, illustrated in Fig. 3, shows a prominent $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^0`$ peak at the expected mass of $`M(p\pi ^{})=1116\pm 1`$ MeV/c2 with instrumental width of $`\sigma =3.3\pm 1.0`$ MeV/c2. Note that distributions of either the total momentum and proton momentum are very similar for the $`p\pi ^{}`$ system from $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^0`$ decay and for the $`K^0p`$ system formed in the reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$. At the same time, the $`K^0`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$ momenta are measured with very similar precision. We may conclude that effective mass of the $`K^0p`$ system, like that of the $`p\pi ^{}`$ system, is measured to a precision of a few MeV/c2.

Effective mass of the $`K^0p`$ system formed in the charge-exchange reaction is plotted in Fig. 4a for all measured events. Qualitatively, a narrow enhancement is seen at the expected mass of the $`Z^+`$ baryon ($`M1530`$ MeV/c2). To estimate the level of background, the mass spectrum of Fig. 4a has been fitted to a linear combination of two regular distributions:

* the $`K^0p`$ mass spectrum expected for the nonresonant charge-exchange reaction $`K^+nK^0p`$, obtained through a simulation that takes into account the momentum distribution of interacting $`K^+`$ mesons, the Fermi motion and binding energy of the target nucleon, the differential cross section for $`K^0`$ emission in the charge-exchange reaction , and actual conditions of the discussed experiment; and
* a distribution obtained by the method of random stars.

The results of the fit are illustrated by the dashed line in Fig. 4a. In the mass interval of 1535–1545 MeV/c2 populated by 107 events, thus estimated background amounts to 83 events resulting in a statistical significance of $`2.6\sigma `$.

It is interesting to see if the observed enhancement is affected by rescattering of reaction products in nuclear matter. In order to remove the events worst affected by rescatterings, additional topological selections444At this stage of the analysis, no kinematic selections based on constraining measured events to $`K^+nK^0p`$ are used. are applied:

* $`\theta _p<100^o`$ and $`\theta _K<100^o`$ for the proton and $`K^0`$ emission angles with respect to $`K^+`$ direction in the laboratory frame;
* $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Phi }_{pK}<0`$ for the azimuthal angle between the proton and $`K^0`$ directions (that is, the proton and $`K^0`$ are required to be back-to-back in the plane transverse to beam direction).

According to a simulation that accounts for Fermi motion of the target neutron, these selections keep the bulk of events of the charge-exchange reaction that are not affected by proton and $`K^0`$ rescattering in nuclear matter. Of the 1112 measured events of the reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$, nearly a half (541 events) survive the additional selections. In the $`K^0p`$ mass spectrum for these events, that is shown in Fig. 4b, the enhancement near 1540 MeV/c2 becomes more prominent. In the mass interval of 1535–1545 MeV/c2, the total number of events is 73 with an estimated background of 44 events, resulting in a statistical significance of $`4.4\sigma `$. In order to estimate the mass and width of the observed resonance, a Gaussian with floating position and r.m.s. is added to the fitting function. The latter fit yields the values $`M=1539\pm 2`$ MeV/c2 and $`\sigma =3`$ MeV/c2.

To summarize, a baryon resonance with mass $`M=1539\pm 2`$ MeV/c2 and width $`\mathrm{\Gamma }9`$ MeV/c2 has been observed in the $`K^0p`$ effective-mass spectrum for the reaction $`K^+\mathrm{Xe}K^0p\mathrm{Xe}^{}`$. The statistical significance of the signal is estimated as $`4.4\sigma `$. The resonance is a strong indication for formation of the exotic pentaquark $`Z^+`$ baryon555The existence of a baryon resonance with positive strangeness looks even more reliable in connection with the recent paper by Y. Nakano et al. (arXiv:hep-ex/0301020) which reports the observation of a baryon resonance in the $`K^+n`$ system with $`M=1.54\pm 0.01`$GeV/c2, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }<25`$ MeV/c2, and significance of $`4.6\sigma `$ in the reaction $`\gamma nK^+K^{}n`$ on 12C.. Our work is still in progress.

We wish to thank A.E. Asratyan for useful comments and discussions. This work is supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (grant 01-02-16465).


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# Chiral and 𝑈(1)_𝐴 restorations high in the hadron spectrum and the semiclassical approximation.

\[

## Abstract

In quantum systems with large $`n`$ (radial quantum number) or large angular momentum the semiclassical (WKB) approximation is valid. A physical content of the semiclassical approximation is that the quantum fluctuations effects are suppressed and vanish asymptotically. The chiral as well as $`U(1)_A`$ breakings in QCD is a result of quantum fluctuations. Hence these breakings must be absent (suppressed) high in the spectrum and the spectrum of high-lying hadrons must exhibit symmetries of the classical QCD Lagrangian.

\] 11footnotetext: e-mail address: leonid.glozman@uni-graz.at

If one neglects tiny masses of $`u`$ and $`d`$ quarks, which are much smaller than $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}`$ or the typical hadronic scale of 1 GeV, then the QCD Lagrangian exhibits the

$$U(2)_L\times U(2)_R=SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R\times U(1)_V\times U(1)_A$$
(1)
symmetry. This is because the quark-gluon interaction Lagrangian in the chiral limit does not mix the left- and right-handed components of quarks and hence the total QCD Lagrangian for the two-flavor QCD can be split into the left-handed and right-handed parts which do not communicate to each other. We know that the $`U(1)_A`$ symmetry of the classical QCD Lagrangian is absent at the quantum level because of the $`U(1)_A`$ anomaly . We also know that the chiral $`SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R`$ symmetry is spontaneously broken in the QCD vacuum. That this is so is directly evidenced by the nonzero value of the quark condensate, $`\overline{q}q=\overline{q}_Lq_R+\overline{q}_Rq_L(240\pm 10MeV)^3`$, which represents an order parameter for spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking. This quark condensate directly shows that in the QCD vacuum the left-handed quarks are correlated with the right-handed antiquarks (and vice verca) and hence the QCD vacuum breaks the chiral symmetry.

That the chiral symmetry is spontaneously broken is also directly seen from the low-lying hadron spectrum. If the chiral symmetry were intact in the vacuum, i.e. it were realized in the Wigner-Weyl mode, then all hadrons would fall into parity-chiral multiplets , i.e. multiplets of the $`SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R\times C_i`$ group, where $`C_i`$ consists of identity and space inversion. In the baryon spectrum these multiplets are either parity doublets in $`N`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ spectrum that are not related to each other, or quartets that contain degenerate parity doublets in the nucleon and delta spectra with the same spin. From the low-lying nucleon and delta spectra we definitely conclude that there are no degeneracies of states of the same spin but opposite parity. This tells that chiral symmetry must be broken in the QCD vacuum, i.e. it is realized in the Nambu-Goldstone mode. Even more, there is no one-to-one mapping of the states with the same spin and opposite parity low in the spectrum. This suggests that low in the spectrum the chiral symmetry is not only strongly broken, but in addition realized nonlinearly . Similar, in the meson spectrum the unbroken chiral symmetry would imply that e.g. $`\pi `$-mesons $`(I,J^P=1,0^{})`$ and pure $`n\overline{n}=\frac{u\overline{u}+d\overline{d}}{\sqrt{2}}`$ $`f_0`$ states $`(I,J^P=0,0^+)`$ would be systematically degenerate, level by level. Clearly it is not the case for the low-lying states (see Fig. 2).

The high-lying hadrons, however, show obvious signs of parity doubling. For example, all the excited nucleons around 1.7 GeV are well established states and we see here three approximate parity doublets with spins 1/2, 3/2 and 5/2. Similar, the lowest excitations with $`J=9/2`$ are also well established states and they represent another good example of parity doubling. Not established states (i.e. candidates, that are marked as ”\**” and ”\*” states according to PDG classification ) also support parity doubling, though the uncertainties are very high (one should not take too seriously ”\*” states, of course). There is a well established state with $`J=11/2`$, where so far no parity partner has been seen. Similar situation occurs in the delta spectrum. It has been suggested recently  that this parity doubling reflects effective chiral symmetry restoration in high-lying hadrons.This phenomenon has been refered to  as chiral symmetry restoration of the second kind in order to distinguish it from the chiral symmetry restoration in the QCD vacuum at high temperature or density. Unfortunately from the baryon spectrum alone we cannot distinguish whether the parity doublets evidence the restoration of chiral or $`U(1)_A`$ symmetriesThe restoration of the $`U(1)_A`$ symmetry, but not of the chiral symmetry, has been suggested by Jaffe as explanation of parity doublets in the baryon spectrum, as cited in ref. . It has been shown in , however, that $`U(1)_A`$ cannot be restored without restoration of $`SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R`$. This is because even if the effects of the axial anomaly vanish, the $`U(1)_A`$ would be still broken if the $`SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R`$ is broken. This is because the same quark condensates in the QCD vacuum break both types of symmetries..

The systematic data on high-lying mesons are still absent in the PDG tables. The results of the ongoing partial wave analysis  of high-lying mesons obtained in $`p\overline{p}`$ annihilation at LEAR suggest a clear evidence  for the chiral symmetry restoration. This is well seen from the Fig.2, where the high-lying $`\pi `$ mesons and $`n\overline{n}`$ $`f_0`$ mesons are shown. There are indications of simultaneous chiral and $`U(1)_A`$ restorations in highly excited mesons , since the highly excited $`\pi `$, $`a_0`$, and $`n\overline{n}`$ $`f_0`$ as well as $`n\overline{n}`$ $`\eta `$ mesons form approximately degenerate multiplets of the $`U(2)_L\times U(2)_R`$ group.

By definition an effective symmetry restoration means the following. In QCD the hadrons with the quantum numbers $`\alpha `$ are created when one applies the local interpolating field (current) $`J_\alpha (x)`$ with such quantum numbers on the vacuum $`|0`$. Then all the hadrons that are created by the given interpolator appear as intermediate states in the two-point correlator

$$\mathrm{\Pi }_{J_\alpha }(q)=id^4xe^{iqx}0|T\left\{J_\alpha (x)J_\alpha (0)\right\}|0,$$
(2)
where all possible Lorentz and Dirac indices (which are specific for a given interpolating field) have been omitted, for simplicity. Consider two local interpolating fields $`J_1(x)`$ and $`J_2(x)`$ which are connected by chiral transformation, $`J_1(x)=UJ_2(x)U^{}`$, where $`USU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R`$ (or by $`U(1)_A`$ transformation). Then if the vacuum is invariant under the given symmetry group, $`U|0=|0`$, it follows from (2) that the spectra created by the operators $`J_1(x)`$ and $`J_2(x)`$ must be identical.

We know that in QCD $`U|0|0`$. As a consequence the corresponding spectral densities $`\rho _1(s)\rho _2(s)`$. However, it may happen that the noninvariance of the vacuum becomes unimportant (irrelevant) high in the spectrum. Then the spectral functions $`\rho _1(s)`$ and $`\rho _2(s)`$ become close at large $`s`$ (identical asymptotically high). This can be refered to as effective chiral symmetry restoration from the low-lying spectrum, where both $`\rho _1(s)`$ and $`\rho _2(s)`$ are very different because of the symmetry breaking in the vacuum, to the high-lying spectrum, where the asymmetry of the vacuum becomes unimportant and $`\rho _1(s)\rho _2(s)`$ (chiral symmetry restoration of the second kind). We stress that this effective chiral symmetry restoration does not mean that chiral symmetry breaking in the vacuum disappears, but only that the role of the quark condensates that break chiral symmetry in the vacuum becomes progressively less important high in the spectrum . The valence quarks in high-lying hadrons decouple from the QCD vacuum.

In ref.  a justification for effective chiral symmetry restoration has been suggested. Namely, at large space-like momenta $`Q^2=q^2>0`$ the correlator can be adequately represented by the operator product expansion, where all nonperturbative effects reside in different condensates . The only effect that spontaneous breaking of chiral symmetry can have on the correlator is via the quark condensate of the vacuum, $`\overline{q}q`$, and higher dimensional condensates that are not invariant under chiral transformation $`U`$. However, the contributions of all these condensates are suppressed by inverse powers of momenta $`Q^2`$. This shows that at large space-like momenta the correlation function becomes chirally symmetric. In other words

$$\mathrm{\Pi }_{J_1}(Q)\mathrm{\Pi }_{J_2}(Q)atQ^2\mathrm{}.$$
(3)
The dispersion relation provides a connection between the space-like and time-like domains for the Lorentz scalar (or pseudoscalar) parts of the correlator. In particular, the large $`Q^2`$ correlator is completely dominated by the large $`s`$ spectral density $`\rho (s)`$, which is an observable. Hence the large $`s`$ spectral density should be insensitive to the chiral symmetry breaking in the vacuum and must satisfy

$$\rho _1(s)\rho _2(s)ats\mathrm{}.$$
(4)
This is in contrast to the low $`s`$ spectral densities $`\rho _1(s)`$ and $`\rho _2(s)`$, which are very different because of the chiral symmetry breaking in the vacuum.

While the argument above on the asymptotic symmetry properties of spectral functions is rather robust (it is based actually only on the asymptotic freedom of QCD at large space-like momenta and on the analyticity of the two-point correlator), it is not clear whether it can be applied to the bound state systems, which the hadrons are. Indeed, it can happen that the asymptotic symmetry restoration applies only to that part of the spectrum, which is above the resonance region (i.e. where the current creates jets but not isolated hadrons). So the question arises whether it is possible to prove (or at least justify) the symmetry restoration in highly excited isolated hadrons. We show below that both chiral and $`U(1)_A`$ restorations in highly excited isolated hadrons must be anticipated as a direct consequence of the semiclassical approximation.

At large $`n`$ (radial quantum number) or at large angular momentum $`L`$ we know that in quantum systems the semiclassical approximation (WKB) must work. Physically this approximation applies in these cases because the de Broglie wavelength of particles in the system is small in comparison with the scale that characterizes the given problem. In such a system as a hadron the scale is given by the hadron size while the wavelength of valence quarks is given by their momenta. Once we go high in the spectrum the size of hadrons increases as well as the typical momentum of valence quarks. This is why a highly excited hadron can be described semiclassically in terms of the underlying quark and gluon degrees of freedom.

A physical content of the semiclassical approximation is most transparently given by the path integral. The contribution of the given path to the path integral is regulated by the action $`S(q)`$ along the path $`q(x,t)`$

$$e^{iS(q)/\mathrm{}}.$$
(5)
The semiclassical approximation applies when $`S(q)\mathrm{}`$. In this case the whole amplitude (path integral) is dominated by the classical path $`q_{cl}`$ (stationary point) and those paths that are infinitesimally close to the classical path. All other paths that differ from the classical one by an appreciable amount do not contribute. These latter paths would represent the quantum fluctuation effects. In other words, in the semiclassical case the quantum fluctuations effects are strongly suppressed and vanish asymptotically.

The $`U(1)_A`$ symmetry of the QCD Lagrangian is broken only due to the quantum fluctuations effects. The $`SU(2)_R\times SU(2)_L`$ spontaneous (dynamical) breaking is also pure quantum effect and is based upon quantum fluctuations. To see the latter we remind the reader that most generally the chiral symmetry breaking (i.e.the dynamical quark mass generation) is formulated via the Schwinger-Dyson equation. It is not yet clear at all which specific gluonic interactions are the most important ones as a kernel of the Schwinger-Dyson equation (e.g. instantons , or gluonic exchanges , or perhaps other gluonic interactions, or a combination of different interactions). But in any case the quantum fluctuations effects of the quark and gluon fields are very strong in the low-lying hadrons and induce both chiral and $`U(1)_A`$ breakings. As a consequence we do not observe any chiral or $`U(1)_A`$ multiplets low in the spectrum. However, if the quantum fluctuations effects are absent or suppressed due to some reasons, then the dynamical mass of quarks must vanish as well as effects of the $`U(1)_A`$ anomaly.

We have just mentioned that in a quantum system with large enough $`n`$ or $`L`$ the quantum fluctuations must be suppressed and vanish asymptotically. Then it follows that in such systems both the chiral and $`U(1)_A`$ symmetries must be restored. Hence at large hadron masses (i.e. with either large $`n`$ or large $`L`$) we must observe symmetries of the classical QCD Lagrangian. This is precisely what we see phenomenologically. In the nucleon spectrum the doubling appears either at large $`n`$ excitations of baryons with the given small spin or in resonances of large spin. Similar features persist in the delta spectrum. In the meson spectrum the doubling is obvious for large $`n`$ excitations of small spin mesons (see Fig. 2) and there are signs of doubling of large spin mesons (the data are, however, sparse). It would be certainly interesting and important to observe systematically multiplets of parity-chiral and parity-$`U(1)_A`$ groups (or, sometimes, when the chiral and $`U(1)_A`$ transformations connect different hadrons , the multiplets of the $`U(2)_L\times U(2)_R`$ group). The high-lying hadron spectra must be systematically explored. This experimental task is just for existing facilities like JLAB, BNL, SPRING 8, ELSA, as well as for the forthcoming Japanese hadron facility and the proton-antiproton ring in Darmstadt.

The strength of the argument given above is that it is very general. Its weakness is that we cannot say anything concrete about microscopical mechanisms of how all this happens. For that one needs a detailed microscopical understanding of dynamics in QCD, which is both challenging and very difficult task. But even though we do not know how microscopically all this happens, we can claim that in highly excited hadrons we must observe symmetries of the classical QCD Lagrangian. The only basis for this statement is that in such hadrons a semiclassical description is correct.

As a consequence, in highly excited hadrons the valence quark motion has to be described semiclassically and at the same time their chirality (helicity) must be fixed. Also the gluonic field should be described semiclassically. All this gives an increasing support for a string picture of highly excited hadrons, where hadrons are viewed as strings with massless quarks of definite chirality at the end-points of the string .

The work was supported by the FWF project P14806-TPH of the Austrian Science Fund.


text:
# Chiral Condensates in Quark and nuclear Matter 1footnote 11footnote 1Respective email addresses of the authors: G.X.Peng, gxpeng@ihep.ac.cn; U.Lombardo, lombardo@lns.infn.it; M.Loewe, mloewe@fis.puc.cl; H.C.Chiang, chiang@ihep.ac.cn; P.Z.Ning, ningpz@nankai.edu.cn

## I Introduction

The spontaneously breaking of chiral symmetry in Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) has been an interesting topic for nuclear physics bro01bro95 . It is expected that this broken symmetry would be restored in a medium, and several signals have recently been suggested for its manifestation in nuclear matter, such as the spectral enhancement near the $`2M_\pi `$ ($`M_\pi `$ is the pion mass) threshold Hatsuda99 , the systematic appearance of the parity doublets in the missing-states region Glozman01 , and the vector manifestation Harada01  etc. It is also shown that the partial restoration of chiral symmetry has strong effects on the nuclear saturation Rapp99  and the nuclear equation of state Santra00 .

One of the most relevant quantity to the chiral symmetry restoration is the scalar quark condensate $`\overline{q}q`$. The zero value of the condensate can be strictly proven to be a necessary condition for exact chiral symmetry. But the sufficiency is not available presently. In fact, Birse has shown that the pieces arising from low-momentum virtual pions should not be associated with chiral restoration Birse . However, more recent investigations are in favor of the hypothesis that the quark condensate is a leading order parameter Cavalcante01 ; Colangelo01 .

The quark condensate in vacuum $`\overline{q}q_0`$ is indeed a vast quantity ($`10^7`$ MeV3). However, this value will be modified in a medium. The change produced by the deuteron has recently been investigated Ballot00 . There are also considerable investigations on the modification due to nuclear and/or quark matter Drukarev99 ; Cohen91 ; Chanfray93 ; Lutz ; Guohua ; Malheiro97 ; Mazy ; Mitsu ; Lilei ; Brock ; Fojii ; Ligq ; Bernard87 ; Jaminon92 . For more references, see relevant review articles bro01bro95 ; Birse94 .

It has long been speculated that strange quark matter (SQM), rather than the normal nuclear matter, might be the true QCD ground state Witten84 , or absolutely stable Jaffe84 ; PengPRC56 ; Cha ; Ben ; Surk . The critical density of SQM depends on the quark mass scaling PengPRC59 , while the quark mass scaling is closely linked to the quark condensate in quark matter PengPRC61 . Therefore, the study of in-medium quark condensates is meaningful independently of whether it can serve as an order parameter of chiral restoration.

Originally, the interacting part of the quark mass was taken to be inversely proportional to density Cha ; Ben ; Surk ; PengPRC59 . That parametrization has no derivation, and leads to inconsistencies in the thermodynamic properties of SQM PengPRC62 . Later, a straightforward derivation method is provided, and the scaling is changed to be inversely proportional to the cubic root of the density PengPRC61 .

One of the most popularly used methods to calculate the in-medium quark condensate is the Feynman-Helmann theorem. The main difficulty in this formalism is that one has to make assumptions on the derivatives of model parameters with respect to the quark current mass. To bypass this difficulty, we will apply a similar idea as in the study of strange quark matter by defining an equivalent mass. A differential equation which determines the equivalent mass will be derived in detail, then it is solved within a QCD-like inter-quark interaction. The normally accepted linear behavior of the condensate in nuclear matter is naturally reproduced and extended to quark matter. However, the decreasing speed of the condensate in quark matter is merely half of that in nuclear matter if the pion-nucleon sigma term is 6 times the average current mass of light quarks. At higher densities, the decreasing speed is usually slowed, compared with the linear extrapolation, due to interactions.

We organize the present paper as follows. In the subsequent Sec. II, we describe the equivalent mass method, and apply it to the investigation of the quark condensate in quark matter. An equation to determine the equivalent mass is derived, solved analytically at lower densities, and solved numerically with a QCD-like inter-quark interaction at higher densities. To test the correctness of the equivalent mass method, we apply it to nuclear matter in Sec. III. The model-independent linear behavior is reproduced and the higher order’s contribution is studied in the mean-field level. Sec. IV is a short summary.

## II The chiral condensate in quark matter

Applying the Feynman-Hellmann theorem, respectively, to the vacuum $`|0`$ and the state $`|n_\text{b}`$ with baryon number density $`n_\text{b}`$, and then taking the difference, as has been done for nuclear matter Cohen91 , one can obtain the following expression for the relative chiral condensate in quark matter:

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{1}{3n^{}}\frac{ϵ}{m_0},$$
(1)
where $`ϵ`$ is the energy density of quark matter above the vacuum, $`m_0=7.5`$ MeV is the average current mass of $`u`$ and $`d`$ quarks, $`n^{}`$ is a constant related to the pion mass $`M_\pi =140`$ MeV and the pion decay constant $`F_\pi =93.2`$ MeV by

$$n^{}\frac{2}{3}\overline{q}q_0=\frac{M_\pi ^2F_\pi ^2}{3m_0}0.98\text{fm}^3.$$
(2)
Here we have used the GellMan-Oakes-Renner relation GOR

$$2m_0\overline{q}q_0=M_\pi ^2F_\pi ^2$$
(3)
and the notations $`O_{n_\text{b}}n_\text{b}|O|n_\text{b}\text{and}O_00|O|0`$ for an arbitrary operator $`O`$.

From Eq. (1), the usual procedure to calculate the in-medium quark condensate will be to find an expression for the energy density, carrying then the derivative with respect to the current quark mass. However, it is usually difficult to know the current quark mass dependence of model parameters, e.g. meson masses, coupling constants, and cutoffs etc., without full understanding how effective models are related to the underlying theory (QCD). To bypass this difficulty, we suggest an equivalent mass method bellow.

The QCD Hamiltonian density for the two-flavor case can be schematically written as

$$H_{\text{QCD}}=H_\text{k}+2m_0\overline{q}q+H_\text{I},$$
(4)
where $`H_\text{k}`$ is the kinetic term, $`H_\text{I}`$ is the interacting part, and $`m_0`$ is the average current mass of $`u`$ and $`d`$ quarks. Terms breaking flavor symmetry have been ignored.

The basic idea of the mass-density-dependent model of quark matter is that the system energy can be expressed in the same form as a proper non-interacting system. The strong interaction between quarks is included within the appropriate variation of quark masses with density. In order not to confuse with other mass concepts, we refer to such a density-dependent mass as an equivalent mass. Therefore, if we use the equivalent mass $`m`$, the system Hamiltonian density should be replaced by an Hamiltonian density of the form

$$H_{\text{eqv}}=H_\text{k}+2m\overline{q}q,$$
(5)
where $`m`$ is the equivalent mass to be determined. Obviously, we must require that the two Hamiltonian densities $`H_{\text{eqv}}`$ and $`H_{\text{QCD}}`$ have the same expectation value for any state $`|\mathrm{\Psi }`$, i.e.,

$$\mathrm{\Psi }|H_{\text{eqv}}|\mathrm{\Psi }=\mathrm{\Psi }|H_{\text{QCD}}|\mathrm{\Psi }.$$
(6)
Applying this equality to the state $`|n_\text{b}`$ with baryon number density $`n_\text{b}`$ and to the vacuum state $`|0`$, respectively, taking then the difference, one has

$$H_{\text{eqv}}_{n_\text{b}}H_{\text{eqv}}_0=H_{\text{QCD}}_{n_\text{b}}H_{\text{QCD}}_0.$$
(7)
Since we are considering a system with uniformly distributed particles, or in other words, the density $`n_\text{b}`$ has nothing to do with the space coordinates, we can write $`\mathrm{\Psi }|m(n_\text{b})\overline{q}q|\mathrm{\Psi }=m(n_\text{b})\mathrm{\Psi }|\overline{q}q|\mathrm{\Psi }.`$ This equality is especially obvious if we consider it in terms of quantum mechanics: $`|\mathrm{\Psi }`$ is a wave function with arguments $`n_\text{b}`$ and coordinates, the expectation value is nothing but an integration with respect to the coordinates. Therefore, if $`n_\text{b}`$ does not depend on coordinates, the function $`m(n_\text{b})`$ is also a coordinate-independent c-number, and can naturally be taken out of the integration. However, if $`n_\text{b}`$ is local, the case becomes much more complicated and we will not consider it here.

Now we can solve Eq. (7) for $`m`$, and accordingly obtain

$$m=m_0+\frac{H_\text{I}_{n_\text{b}}H_\text{I}_0}{2(\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}\overline{q}q_0)}m_0+m_\text{I}.$$
(8)
Therefore, considering our quarks as a free system, i.e. without interactions, while keeping the system energy unchanged, quarks should acquire an equivalent mass of the form shown in Eq. (8). From this equation we see that the equivalent mass $`m`$ includes two parts: one is the original mass or current mass $`m_0`$, the other one is the interacting part $`m_\text{I}`$. Obviously the equivalent mass is a function of both the quark current mass and the density. At finite temperature, it depends also on the temperature as well. Here we consider only zero temperature. Due to the quark confinement and asymptotic freedom, one may naturally expect

$$\underset{n_\text{b}0}{lim}m_\text{I}=\mathrm{}\text{and}\underset{n_\text{b}\mathrm{}}{lim}m_\text{I}=0.$$
(9)
Because the Hamiltonian density $`H_{\text{eqv}}`$ has the same form as that of a system of free particles with equivalent mass $`m`$, the energy density of quark matter can be expressed as

$$ϵ=\frac{g}{2\pi ^2}_0^{k_\text{f}}\sqrt{k^2+m^2}k^2𝑑k=3mn_\text{b}F\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right),$$
(10)
where $`g=2`$(flavor)$`\times `$3(colors)$`\times `$2(spins) = 12 is the degeneracy factor,

$$k_\text{f}=\left(\frac{18}{g}\pi ^2n_\text{b}\right)^{1/3}$$
(11)
is the Fermi momentum of quarks.

Substituting Eq. (10) into Eq. (1) and carrying out the corresponding derivative, we have

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{n_\text{b}}{n^{}}f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)\frac{m}{m_0},$$
(12)
where the chain relation

$$\frac{ϵ}{m_0}=\frac{ϵ}{m}\frac{m}{m_0}$$

has been used. The functions $`F`$ in Eq. (10) and $`f`$ in Eq. (12) are, respectively, defined to be

$`F(x)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{8}}\left[x\sqrt{x^2+1}\left(2x^2+1\right)\text{arcsinh}(x)\right]/x^3,`$ (13)
$`f(x)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\left[x\sqrt{x^2+1}\mathrm{ln}\left(x+\sqrt{x^2+1}\right)\right]/x^3`$ (14)
which have the following properties:

$`F(x)x{\displaystyle \frac{dF(x)}{dx}}=f(x),`$ (15)
$`\underset{x0}{lim}F(x)=1,\underset{x\mathrm{}}{lim}F(x){\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\left(x+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{x}}\right),`$ (16)
$`\underset{x0}{lim}f(x)=1,\underset{x\mathrm{}}{lim}f(x){\displaystyle \frac{3}{2x}}.`$ (17)
Defining $`H_\text{I}`$ to be the interacting energy density $`H_\text{I}_{n_\text{b}}H_\text{I}_0`$ and considering Eq. (2), the interacting part of the equivalent mass, $`m_\text{I}`$ in Eq. (8), can be re-written as

$$m_\text{I}=\frac{H_\text{I}/(3n^{})}{1\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}/\overline{q}q_0}.$$
(18)
Solving for the ratio $`\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}/\overline{q}q_0`$, this equation leads to

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{1}{3n^{}}\frac{H_\text{I}}{m_\text{I}}.$$
(19)
According to Eq. (4), the total energy density of the quark matter system can be expressed as

$$ϵ=\frac{g}{2\pi ^2}_0^{k_\text{f}}\sqrt{k^2+m_0}k^2𝑑k+H_\text{I}.$$
(20)
The first term is the energy density without interactions, the second term $`H_\text{I}`$ is the interacting part. On the other hand, we have already expressed $`ϵ`$ in Eq. (10). So, replacing the $`ϵ`$ here with the right hand side of Eq. (10), then dividing by $`3n_\text{b}`$, we naturally get

$$\frac{H_\text{I}}{3n_\text{b}}=mF\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)m_0F\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right).$$
(21)
Substituting this into Eq. (19) gives

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{n_\text{b}}{n^{}}\frac{1}{m_\text{I}}\left[mF\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)m_0F\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)\right].$$
(22)
Equating the right hand side of this equation with that of Eq. (12), one can easily get a fisrt order differential equation

$$\frac{m}{m_0}=\frac{mF\left(k_\mathrm{f}/m\right)m_0F\left(k_\mathrm{f}/m_0\right)}{(mm_0)f\left(k_\mathrm{f}/m\right)}$$
(23)
satisfied by the equivalent mass. Eqs. (21)-(23) seem similar to the Eqs. (23)-(25) in Ref. PengPLB548 . They are in fact different by a factor of $`N_\text{f}`$, the number of quark flavors. This difference will lead to different numerical results.

Now we have another formalism which can be used to calculate the in-medium chiral condensate. In principle, one can calculate the chiral condensate at any finite density from Eqs. (22) with the aid of Eqs. (23) and (21), if one knows some information on the interacting energy density $`H_\mathrm{I}`$ from a realistic quark model. The obvious advantage of this formalism is that one does not need to make assumptions on the current mass derivatives of model parameters. In the following, let’s consider a simple model as an example.

If we denote the average distance between quarks by $`\overline{r}`$, the interaction between quarks by $`\text{v}(m_0,n_\text{b})`$, and assume each quark can only interact strongly with another $`N_0`$ nearest quarks at any moment, because of the saturation property of strong interactions, we can link the interacting energy density $`H_\text{I}`$ to density by

$$H_\text{I}=\frac{3}{2}N_0n_\text{b}\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r}).$$
(24)
This is obtained as follows. Suppose the total particle number is $`N`$. The interacting energy due to particle $`i`$ is $`N_0\text{v}(m_0,n_\text{b})`$, accordingly the total interacting energy is $`\frac{1}{2}_{i=1}^NN_0\text{v}(m_0,n_\text{b})=\frac{1}{2}NN_0\text{v}(m_0,n_\text{b})`$ (the extra factor 1/2 is for the correction of double counting). Dividing this by the volume, we then have the interacting energy density in Eq. (24) where the average inter-quark distance $`\overline{r}`$ is linked to density through

$$\overline{r}=\frac{\xi }{n_\text{b}^{1/3}}.$$
(25)
The average volume occupied by one particle is $`1/(3n_\text{b})`$. If this volume is considered as a spherical ball of diameter $`\overline{r}`$, one finds $`\xi =(2/\pi )^{1/3}`$. If, however, this volume is considered as a cubic box of side $`\overline{r}`$, one has $`\xi =1/3^{1/3}`$. In the former case, one divides the system into sub balls and place a particle at the center of each small ball. In the latter case, the system is divided into sub cubic boxes. Obviously there are unoccupied spaces between balls in the former case, so we take the latter value, i.e., $`\xi =1/3^{1/3}`$.

Eq. (24) may not be an absolutely exact expression for the interacting energy density. Some other components, for example, the possible three-body interactions, have not been included. However, they should be of higher orders in density, and will not be considered here. To compensate for these ignorance, to some extent, one may regard the $`N_0`$ as a free parameter. However, we will take $`N_0=2`$ due to the fact that the quark has a trend to interact strongly with other two quarks to form a baryon. It will soon be shown that the relative chiral condensate is independent of the concrete $`N_0`$ value at lower densities.

Substituting Eq. (24) into Eq. (21) gives

$$\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})=\frac{2}{N_0}\left[mF\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)m_0F\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)\right].$$
(26)
Keeping in mind the second equalities in Eq. (9) and in Eq. (16), we have

$$\underset{n_\text{b}\mathrm{}}{lim}\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})=0.$$
(27)
Note that we have said nothing about the form of the inter-quark interaction v$`(m_0,n_\text{b})`$.

At the same time, Eq. (19) should be compatible with Eq. (12). Comparing the right hand side of these two equations, we get

$$f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)m_\text{I}\frac{m}{m_0}=\frac{N_0}{2}\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r}).$$
(28)
Because Eq. (23) is a first order differential equation, we need an initial condition at $`m_0=m_0^{}`$ to get a definite solution. Let’s suppose it to be

$$m(m_0^{},n_\text{b})=m(n_\text{b}).$$
(29)
Usually, we will have

$$\text{v}(m_0,n_\text{b})|_{m_0=m_0^{}}=v(\overline{r}),$$
(30)
where $`v(\overline{r})`$ is the inter-quark interaction for the special value $`m_0^{}`$ of the quark current mass $`m_0`$.

Eq. (23) is difficult to solve analytically. However, this can be done at lower densities. For convenience, let’s first prove that the equivalent mass can be explicitly expressed through the inter-quark interaction as

$$m=m_0+\frac{\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})}{\frac{2}{N_0}f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)+\frac{\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})}{m_0}}.$$
(31)
In fact, taking the derivative with respect to $`m_0`$ at both sides of Eq. (26) gives

$$f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m}\right)\frac{m}{m_0}=f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)+\frac{N_0}{2}\frac{\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})}{m_0}.$$
(32)
Here Eq. (15) has been applied. Then substituting Eq. (32) into Eq. (28), we immediately get Eq. (31).

At lower densities, the Fermi momentum $`k_\text{f}`$ is small, so the function $`F(x)`$ approaches to 1. Accordingly, Eq. (26) leads to

$$m=m_0+\frac{N_0}{2}\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r}).$$
(33)
Replacing the left hand side of Eq. (31) with this expression, we get

$$\frac{N_0}{2}\frac{\text{v}}{m_0}+f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)=1.$$
(34)
Integrating this equation under the initial condition given in Eq. (30), we have

$$\text{v}(m_0,\overline{r})=v(\overline{r})+_{m_0^{}}^{m_0}\frac{2}{N_0}\left[1f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)\right]𝑑m_0.$$
(35)
Then the interacting part of the equivalent mass is

$$m_\text{I}(m_0,n_\text{b})=\frac{N_0}{2}v(\overline{r})+_{m_0^{}}^{m_0}\left[1f\left(\frac{k_\text{f}}{m_0}\right)\right]𝑑m_0.$$
(36)
It is interesting to note that Eq. (36) can, because of the dominant linear confining interaction, lead to a quark mass scaling of the form $`m_\text{I}1/n_\text{b}^{1/3}`$ which is consistent with the result in Ref. PengPRC61 .

Substituting the above results for v and $`m_\text{I}`$ into Eq. (19) gives

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\text{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{n_\text{b}}{n^{}}.$$
(37)
This result is very similar to the famous model-independent result for the quark condensate in nuclear matter

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}\text{with}\rho ^{}\frac{M_\pi ^2F_\pi ^2}{\sigma _\text{N}},$$
(38)
which was first proposed by Drukarev et al. Drukarev99 , and later re-justified by many authors Cohen91 ; Chanfray93 ; Lutz . We will also reproduce it in the next section within the present approach.

Both Eqs. (37) and (38) mean a linear decreasing of the condensate at lower densities. The ratio of their decreasing speeds is

$$\frac{1/n^{}}{1/\rho ^{}}=\frac{\rho ^{}}{n^{}}=\frac{3m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}}.$$
(39)
If one takes $`m_0=(m_{u0}+m_{d0})/2=(5+10)/2=7.5`$ MeV Gasser82  and $`\sigma _\text{N}=45`$ MeV Gasser91 ; Ericson87 ; Gensini80 , i.e., the sigma commutator is about six times the average current mass, the decreasing speed in quark matter is merely half of that in nuclear matter. If, however, one takes for $`\sigma _\text{N}`$ a value of about three times $`m_0`$, as previously determined Banerjee77 , the two decreasing speeds are equal. More recent investigations are in support of a bigger value for $`\sigma _\text{N}`$ Sainio95 ; Gibbs98 .

In general, an explicit analytical solution for the condensate is not available, and we have to perform numerical calculations. For a given inter-quark interaction $`v(\overline{r})`$, we can first solve Eq. (26) to obtain the initial condition in Eq. (29) for the equivalent mass, then solve the differential Eq. (23), and finally calculate the quark condensate through Eq. (22).

There are various expressions for $`v(\overline{r})`$ in literature, e.g., the Cornell potential Eichten75 , the Richardson potential Richardson79 , the so-called QCD potentials Fischler77 ; Billoire80 , and purely phenomenological potentials Quigg77 ; Martin80 , etc. A common feature among them is that they are all flavor-independent. This independence is supported in a model-independent way by applying the inverse scattering approach to extract a potential from the measured spectra Quigg81 . Let’s take a QCD-like interaction of the form

$$v(\overline{r})=\sigma \overline{r}\frac{4}{3}\frac{\alpha _s(\overline{r})}{\overline{r}}.$$
(40)
The linear term $`\sigma \overline{r}`$ is the long-range confining part. It is consistent with modern lattice simulations and string investigations lattice ; string . The second term incorporates perturbative effects. To second order in perturbation theory, one has Fischler77 ; Billoire80

$$\alpha _s(\overline{r})=\frac{4\pi }{b_0\lambda (\overline{r})}\left[1\frac{b_1}{b_0^2}\frac{\mathrm{ln}\lambda (\overline{r})}{\lambda (\overline{r})}+\frac{b_2}{\lambda (\overline{r})}\right]$$
(41)
where Igi86

$$\lambda (\overline{r})\mathrm{ln}[(\overline{r}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\overline{ms}})^2+b]$$
(42)
with $`b_0=(11N_\text{c}2N_\text{f})/3`$, $`b_1=[34N_\text{c}^2N_\text{f}(13N_\text{c}^23)/N_\text{c}]/3`$, and $`b_3=(31N_\text{c}10N_\text{f})/(9b_0)`$ for SU($`N_\text{c}`$) and $`N_\text{f}`$ flavors.

Besides these constants, there are three parameters, i.e., $`\sigma `$, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\overline{ms}}`$, and $`b`$. The QCD scale parameter is usually taken to be $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\overline{ms}}=300`$ MeV. The value for the string tension $`\sigma `$ from potential models varies in the range of 0.18—0.22 GeV2 Veseli96 , and we here take $`\sigma =0.2`$ GeV2. As for the parameter $`b`$, we take three values, i.e., 10, 20, and 30, in the reasonable range Igi86 . Because these parameters are determined from heavy quark experimental data, the initial value $`m_0^{}`$ is taken to be 1500 MeV which is compatible with the mass of heavy quarks. If we change this value to a smaller one, the global features of the condensate will not be changed significantly. Our numerical results are plotted in Fig. 1 and Fig. 2.

Figure 1 shows the density behavior of the chiral condensate in quark matter. The straight line is the linear extrapolation of Eq. (37). It does not depend on the form of the inter-quark interaction $`v(\overline{r})`$, and so, at this meaning, ‘model-independent’. The other three lines are for $`m_0=7.5`$ MeV, but for different $`b`$ values, as indicated in the legend. At lower densities, the chiral condensate decreases linearly with increasing densities. When the density becomes higher, the decreasing speed is slowed.

Figure 2 shows the current mass dependence of the chiral condensate in quark matter. From Eqs. (22) and (23), it is not difficult to obtain

$$\frac{}{m_0}\left(\frac{\overline{q}q_{n_\mathrm{b}}}{\overline{q}q_0}\right)=\frac{n_\text{b}}{n_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}F^{}\left\{\frac{dn^{}}{dm_0}\frac{n^{}}{m_\text{I}}\left[2\frac{F^{}}{f^{}}\frac{f_0^{}}{F^{}}\right]\right\}$$
(43)
with $`F^{}(n_\text{b},m_\text{I})\left[mF\left((k_\text{f}/m)\right)m_0F\left((k_\text{f}/m_0)\right)\right]/m_\mathrm{I},`$ $`f^{}f(k_\text{f}/m)`$, and $`f_0^{}f(k_\text{f}/m_0).`$ The first term in the brace is due to the $`m_0`$ dependence of the vacuum condensate while the second term is purely due to the density. Here the numerical calculation only considers the second term to concentrate on the density effect. For the model Eq. (24) with Eq. (40), the condensate drops when the current mass becomes large. This effect is especially obvious at higher densities. At lower densities, the condensate changes little with increasing current mass. This is understandable: because we have in fact assumed that the vacuum condensate or the quantity $`n^{}`$ in Eq. (2) is constant, the lower density condensate is nearly only a function of the density. If, however, the first term is negative, i.e., the absolute value of the vacuum condensate decreases with increasing $`m_0`$, as indicated in Ref. Musakhanov02 , the in-medium condensate will drops more rapidly. On the other hand, if the first term is positive enough, the in-medium condensate will go up with increasing $`m_0`$.

Finally in this section, we would like to comment that one can adopt any realistic model to calculate the density dependence, and also current mass dependence if necessary, of the in-medium quark condensate without making any further assumption by following the formalism presented here, although we adopted a simple QCD-like interaction as an example. The procedure is as follows. One first has the interacting energy density $`H_\text{I}`$ from the selected realistic model for a special current mass value, gets the corresponding initial equivalent mass $`m(n_\text{b})`$ in Eq. (29) from Eq. (21), obtains the equivalent mass $`m(m_0,n_\text{b})`$ by solving Eq. (23), calculates then the quark condensate through Eq. (22).

## III The quark condensate in nuclear matter

In order to examine the correctness of the equivalent mass method, we now apply it to the investigation of the quark condensate in nuclear matter.

To make a transit from quark matter to nuclear matter, we suppose that nuclear matter can be well described by some effective Hamiltonian density which can be schematically expressed in the form

$$_{\text{NM}}=_\text{k}+2M_\text{N}\overline{N}N+_\text{I},$$
(44)
where $`M_\text{N}=938.926`$ is the mass of nucleons in free space, $`_\text{k}`$ is the kinetic term, $`_\text{I}`$ is the interaction term between nucleons. We also ignore the nucleon mass difference. In principle, the following equality should hold for any nuclear state $`|\rho `$ with nucleon number density $`\rho `$:

$$\rho |_{\text{NM}}|\rho =\rho |H_{\text{QCD}}|\rho .$$
(45)
Here $`H_{\text{QCD}}`$ represents the QCD Hamiltonian density in Eq. (4). Proceeding in the similar way as in the preceding section, we define an equivalent Hamiltonian density

$$_{\text{eqv}}=_\text{k}+2M\overline{N}N,$$
(46)
where $`M`$ is an equivalent mass to be determined by the requirement that the energy of this Hamiltonian is equal to the original interacting system, i.e.

$$\rho |_{\text{eqv}}|\rho =\rho |_{\text{NM}}|\rho .$$
(47)
Applying this equality to the nuclear state $`|\rho `$ and the vacuum state $`|0`$, respectively, and then taking the difference, we have

$$\rho |_{\text{eqv}}|\rho 0|_{\text{eqv}}|0=\rho |_{\text{NM}}|\rho 0|_{\text{NM}}|0.$$
(48)
Solving for $`M`$, this equation gives

$`M`$ $`=`$ $`M_\text{N}+{\displaystyle \frac{\rho |_\text{I}|\rho 0|_\text{I}|0}{2\left[\rho |\overline{N}N|\rho 0|\overline{N}N|0\right]}}`$ (49)
$``$ $`M_\text{N}+M_\text{I}.`$ (50)
Obviously, $`M_\text{I}`$ comes from the interaction between nucleons. It is generally a function of both the density $`\rho `$ and the quark current mass $`m_0`$. If the density $`\rho `$ is not too high, $`M_\text{I}`$ is empirically much smaller than $`M_\text{N}`$. For example, the binding energy per nucleon is less than 2% of the free nucleon mass at the nuclear saturation density. Because no interaction exists when the density becomes zero, we naturally expect

$$\underset{\rho 0}{lim}M_\text{I}=0\text{or}\underset{\rho 0}{lim}M=M_\text{N}.$$
(51)
Using the equivalent mass, the energy density of the nuclear matter can be expressed as

$$ϵ_\text{N}=\frac{g_\text{N}}{2\pi ^2}_0^{p_\text{f}}\sqrt{p^2+M^2}p^2𝑑p,$$
(52)
where $`g_\text{N}=2`$(isospins)$`\times `$ 2(spins) = 4 is the degeneracy factor, $`p_\text{f}=\left(6\pi ^2\rho /g_\text{N}\right)^{1/3}`$ is the Fermi momentum of nucleons.

From the application of the Hellmann-Feynman theorem and the GellMann-Oakes-Renner relation, as was done in Ref. Cohen91 , one can easily get

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{1}{3n^{}}\frac{dϵ_\text{N}}{dm_0}.$$
(53)
Here $`ϵ_\text{N}`$ is the energy density of nuclear matter, and the quantity $`n^{}`$ is given in Eq. (2).

Substituting Eq. (52) into Eq. (53), we have

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}}`$ $`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3n^{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_\text{N}}{M}}{\displaystyle \frac{M}{m_0}},`$ (54)
$`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{3n^{}}}f\left({\displaystyle \frac{p_\text{f}}{M}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{}{m_0}}\left[M_\text{N}+M_\text{I}\right].`$ (55)
$`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}}f\left({\displaystyle \frac{p_\text{f}}{M}}\right)\left[1+{\displaystyle \frac{m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}}}{\displaystyle \frac{M_\text{I}}{m_0}}\right].`$ (56)
In obtaining the third equality, we have used the definition of the pion-nucleon sigma term Gasser81

$$\sigma _\text{N}=m_0\frac{dM_\text{N}}{dm_0}\text{or}\frac{dM_\text{N}}{dm_0}=\frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}.$$
(57)
The physical meaning of the equivalent mass is that nucleons should have the equivalent mass if the system is free but with unchanged energy. It is not difficult to prove that such an equivalent mass always exists. In principle, if one obtain the energy density $`ϵ_\text{N}`$ with some realistic models or even from QCD in the future, the equivalent mass $`M`$ can be obtained by solving the equation (52). For example, Fig. 3 shows the result from the Dirac-Brueckner method with Bonn-B potential Machleidt .

It should be emphasized that the equivalent mass $`M`$ is different from the conventional effective mass $`M^{}`$ of nucleons. For example, at lower densities in Quantum Hadrondynamics (QHD) Walecka , the equivalent mass and effective mass can be expressed as

$`M^{}`$ $`=`$ $`M_\text{N}{\displaystyle \frac{g_\sigma ^2}{M_\sigma ^2}}\rho ,`$ (58)
$`M`$ $`=`$ $`M_\text{N}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{g_\sigma ^2}{M_\sigma ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{g_\omega ^2}{M_\omega ^2}}\right)\rho ,`$ (59)
where $`M_\sigma =550`$ MeV and $`M_\omega =783`$ MeV are, respectively, the masses for the $`\sigma `$ and $`\omega `$ mesons, and $`g_\sigma =10.2`$ and $`g_\omega =12.55`$ are the corresponding coupling constants.

It is obvious from Eqs. (58) and (59) that the conventional effective mass includes merely the contribution from scalar mesons while the equivalent mass also includes the contribution from other mesons.

Equations (58) and (59) are obtained as such. The QHD Lagrangian is

$`L`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}\left[\gamma ^\mu (i_\mu g_\omega \omega _\mu )(M_Ng_\sigma \sigma )\right]\mathrm{\Psi }+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}_\mu \sigma ^\mu \sigma `$ (60)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M_\sigma ^2\sigma ^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M_\omega ^2\omega _\mu \omega ^\mu .`$
At the mean-field level, we have the following energy density Walecka

$`ϵ_{\text{QHD}}`$ $`=`$ $`g_N{\displaystyle _0^{p_\text{f}}}\sqrt{p^2+M_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{d^3p}{(2\pi )^3}}`$ (61)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{M_\sigma ^2}{2g_\sigma ^2}}\left(M_NM_N^{}\right)^2+{\displaystyle \frac{g_\omega ^2}{2M_\omega ^2}}\rho ^2,`$
where the effective mass $`M^{}`$ is determined by the self-consistent equation

$$M^{}=M_N\frac{g_\sigma ^2}{M_\sigma ^2}\frac{g_N}{2\pi ^2}_0^{p_\text{f}}\frac{M^{}p^2dp}{\sqrt{p^2+M_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}}$$
(62)
obtained by minimizing the energy density Eq. (61).

Taking the approximation $`\sqrt{p^2+M_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}M^{}`$ in Eq. (62) gives Eq. (58) immediately. As for Eq. (59), it should be solved from

$$ϵ_N(M,\rho )=ϵ_{\text{QHD}}.$$
(63)
Here the $`ϵ_N(M,\rho )`$ is the right hand side (r.h.s.) of Eq. (52) and $`ϵ_{\text{QHD}}`$ is the r.h.s. of Eq. (61). Taking the approximation

$$\sqrt{p^2+M^2}M\text{and}\sqrt{p^2+M_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}M^{}$$
(64)
in Eq. (63), Eq. (59) is accordingly obtained.

Naturally, Eqs. (58) and (59) are valid only to first order in density. For accurate relations, we have solved Eqs. (62) and (63) numerically. The results are plotted in Fig. 4.

From Fig. 3 and Fig. 4, we see clearly that $`M_\text{I}`$ is much smaller than $`M_\text{N}`$. Up to three times the normal nuclear density, $`M_\text{I}`$ is less than 6 percent of $`M_\text{N}`$. Also, when the density does not exceed the deconfinement density, $`M_\text{I}`$ must be a continuous function of density. Therefore, we ignore the second term in the bracket of Eq. (55), and get

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right).$$
(65)
Because the second term in the bracket of Eq. (56) has a factor $`m_0/\sigma _\text{N}`$ which is much smaller than 1, we can also ignore the corresponding term and get the same expression.

Due to the smallness of the ratio $`p_\text{f}/M`$ at lower densities, the function $`f(p_\text{f}/M)`$ approaches to unity. Accordingly, Eq. (65) becomes Eq. (38), although Eq. (65) is in principle more accurate. Naturally, if one wants to study the higher density behavior of the quark condensate in nuclear matter, the function $`f(p_\text{f}/M)`$ should be kept. Also at higher densities, the omitted interacting part $`M_\text{I}`$ should be taken into account. In the following, we try to consider it in the mean-field level.

As has been found by Malheiro et alMalheiro97 , the quark condensate can also be linked to the trace of energy-momentum tensor of nuclear matter, i.e.

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{1}{\rho ^{}}\frac{ϵ_\text{N}3P}{M_\text{N}}.$$
(66)
To continue our discussion, we now adopt this equality directly in our present model. Because it is justified by Malheiro et alMalheiro97  in the mean-field approximation of Walecka, ZM, and ZM3 models, our treatment in the following are expected to be at least valid at mean-field level. In our case, the energy density $`ϵ_\text{N}`$ is related to the equivalent mass $`M`$ by Eq. (52) which, after performing the integration, gives

$$ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )=M\rho F\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right).$$
(67)
Here the function $`F`$ is the same as in Eq. (13).

The pressure $`P`$ can be obtained from Eq. (67), i.e.

$$P=M\rho G\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right)+\rho ^2\frac{M}{\rho }f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right),$$
(68)
where the function $`f`$ is given by Eq. (13), the function $`G`$ is defined to be

$$G(x)=\frac{1}{8}\left[x(2x^23)\sqrt{x^2+1}+3\text{arcsinh}(x)\right]/x^3.$$
(69)
The second term on the r.h.s. of Eq. (68) is from the density dependence of the equivalent mass. In obtaining the pressure $`P`$, one should be very careful. Otherwise, inconsistencies will appear in this model. For thermodynamic details, see our recent publication PengPRC62 .

Combining Eqs. (55) and (66) gives

$$\frac{\rho }{3n^{}}f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right)\frac{M}{m_0}=\frac{1}{\rho ^{}}\frac{ϵ_\text{N}3P}{M_\text{N}}.$$
(70)
substituting Eqs. (67) and (68) into Eq. (70), we have

$$\frac{\rho ^{}}{3n^{}}\frac{M}{m_0}=\frac{M}{M_\text{N}}\left[\frac{F(p_\text{f}/M)3G(p_\text{f}/M)}{f(p_\text{f}/M)}\frac{3\rho }{M}\frac{M}{\rho }\right].$$
(71)
Because of the equalities,

$$\frac{F(x)3G(x)}{f(x)}=1\text{and}\frac{\rho ^{}}{3n^{}}=\frac{m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}},$$
(72)
Eq. (71) can be cast to

$$\frac{m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}}\frac{M}{m_0}+\frac{3\rho }{M_\text{N}}\frac{M}{\rho }=\frac{M}{M_\text{N}}.$$
(73)
This partial differential equation is linear and of first order. To find a special solution for our purpose, let’s expand the equivalent mass $`M`$ in a Taylor series at zero density, i.e.

$$M(\rho ,m_0)=\underset{i}{}c_i\rho ^i=c_0+c_1\rho +c_2\rho ^2+c_3\rho ^3.$$
(74)
In principle, this expansion can have an arbitrarily large number of higher order terms in density. But, for the moment, we only consider terms up to the third order in density. We will discuss this problem at the end of this section.

Substituting Eq. (74) into Eq. (73) leads to

$$\frac{m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}}\underset{i}{}c_{i}^{}{}_{}{}^{}\rho ^i+\frac{3}{M_\text{N}}\underset{i}{}ic_i\rho ^i=\frac{1}{M_\text{N}}\underset{i}{}c_i\rho ^i,$$
(75)
where $`c_{i}^{}{}_{}{}^{}dc_i/dm_0`$. Comparing the coefficients in Eq. (75), we have

$$c_{i}^{}{}_{}{}^{}=\frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}\frac{3i1}{M_\text{N}}c_i,$$
(76)
or explicitly,

$`c_{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}}{\displaystyle \frac{c_0}{M_\text{N}}},`$ (77)
$`c_{1}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ $`=`$ $`2{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}}{\displaystyle \frac{c_1}{M_\text{N}}},`$ (78)
$`c_{2}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ $`=`$ $`5{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}}{\displaystyle \frac{c_2}{M_\text{N}}},`$ (79)
$`c_{3}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ $`=`$ $`8{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{m_0}}{\displaystyle \frac{c_3}{M_\text{N}}}.`$ (80)
From Eqs. (51) and (74), we can easily get $`c_0=M_\text{N}`$. In this case, Eq. (77) becomes $`c_{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{}=\sigma _\text{N}/m_0`$, which is consistent with Eq. (57).

It should be pointed out that the coefficients $`c_i`$ in the Taylor expansion (74) are $`m_0`$-dependent. In fact, we can integrate Eq. (76) and get

$$c_i=c_i(7.5)\left[\mathrm{exp}\left(_{7.5}^{m_0}\frac{\sigma _\text{N}}{M_\text{N}}\frac{dm_0}{m_0}\right)\right]^{3i1},$$
(81)
where $`c_i(7.5)`$ is the value for $`c_i`$ at $`m_0=7.5`$ MeV which is the value we take for the current mass of $`u`$ and $`d`$ quarks.

Now let’s substitute Eq. (74) into Eq. (55) or (56) and get

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right)\left[1+\frac{m_0}{\sigma _\text{N}}\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}c_{i}^{}{}_{}{}^{}\rho ^i\right].$$
(82)
On applying Eq. (76), we finally have

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right)\left[1\frac{1}{M_\text{N}}\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}(3i1)c_i\rho ^i\right].$$
(83)
For figure-plotting convenience, let’s change the coefficients $`c_i`$ (i=1,2,3) to $`a_i`$ by defining

$$a_i=\frac{\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{i}}{M_\text{N}}c_i\text{or}c_i=\frac{M_\text{N}}{\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{i}}a_i.$$
(84)
Accordingly, Eqs. (74) and (83) become, respectively,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{M}{M_\text{N}}}`$ $`=`$ $`1+a_1{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho _0}}+a_2\left({\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho _0}}\right)^2+a_3\left({\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho _0}}\right)^3,`$ (85)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}}`$ $`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}}f\left({\displaystyle \frac{p_\text{f}}{M}}\right)\left[1{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}(3i1)a_i\left({\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{\rho _0}}\right)^i\right].`$ (86)
To obtain the values of the coefficients $`a_1,a_2`$, and $`a_3`$, we can use the following known experimental properties of nuclear matter

$`{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )}{\rho }}|_{\rho =\rho _0}=M_\text{N}+E_\text{b},`$ (87)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\rho }}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )}{\rho }}\right]|_{\rho =\rho _0}=0,`$ (88)
$`9\rho _0^2{\displaystyle \frac{d^2}{d\rho ^2}}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )}{\rho }}\right]|_{\rho =\rho _0}=K.`$ (89)
Here $`\rho _0=0.17`$ fm-3 is the normal nuclear saturation density, $`E_\text{b}=16`$ MeV is the nuclear binding energy. As for the incompressibility $`K`$, it is not so definite, maybe ranging from 150 to 350 MeV. The expression $`ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )/\rho =MF(p_\text{f}/M)`$ is the energy per nucleon. For a given $`K`$, we can solve Eqs. (87-89) and get the values for $`M^{(i)}`$ ($`i`$=0,1,2):

$`M^{(0)}`$ $``$ $`M|_{\rho =\rho _0},`$ (90)
$`M^{(1)}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M}{\rho }}|_{\rho =\rho _0},`$ (91)
$`M^{(2)}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{^2M}{\rho ^2}}|_{\rho =\rho _0}.`$ (92)
Substituting the expansion (85) into the right hand side of Eqs. (90-92) and then solving for $`a_1,a_2`$, and $`a_3`$, we have

$`a_1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{M_\text{N}}}\left[3(M_\text{N}M^{(0)})+2M^{(1)}\rho _0{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M^{(2)}\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}\right],`$ (93)
$`a_2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{M_\text{N}}}\left[3(M_\text{N}M^{(0)})+3M^{(1)}\rho _0M^{(2)}\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}\right],`$ (94)
$`a_3`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{M_\text{N}}}\left[M_\text{N}M^{(0)}+M^{(1)}\rho _0{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M^{(2)}\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}\right].`$ (95)
The quark condensate can then be calculated by Eq. (86).

In Fig. 5, we give, on the left axe, the coefficients $`a_1,a_2`$, and $`a_3`$ as a function of $`K`$. Another two lines on the right axe are to be explained a little later.

Fig. 6 shows the equation of state of nuclear matter for typical incompressibilities. The open circle corresponds to the saturation which is a mechanically stable point, so every line passes it by. The points marked with a solid circle are also in mechanical equilibrium, but they are not stable. When the density is between the open and solid circle, the pressure is positive. However, when the density exceeds the full circle, the pressure is drastically negative, so the system will automatically contract and the deconfinement phase is expected to appear. We therefore use $`\rho _\text{d}`$ to remember this density and plot it in Fig. 5 with a solid line on the right axe. We can also see that the incompressibility $`K`$ should be no less than 265 MeV because nuclear matter will be less bounded than 16 MeV on the right side when $`K<265`$, i.e. the difference of the energy corresponding to the solid and open circles is smaller than 16 MeV if $`K`$ is less than 265 MeV.

The quark condensate is given in Fig. 7 for typical values of $`K`$. For $`K>265`$, the critical density $`\rho _\text{c}`$ where the quark condensate becomes zero is generally bigger than that obtained by extrapolating the model-independent result of Eq. (38) (indicated with the word ’Linear’ in the figure legend). The variation of the critical density with the incompressibility is shown in Fig. 5 with a dotted line on the right axe. A noticeable feature is that, for $`K>326`$, there appears a hill where the chiral symmetry breaking might be enhanced.

As mentioned before, the Taylor expansion Eq. (74) can have infinitely large number of terms in density. However, it has been obviously shown in Fig. 5 that

$$|a_1|>|a_2|>|a_3|.$$
(96)
This is an indication that the higher the term’s order is, the less important its contribution. This is why we have only taken to the third order in the expansion Eq. (74). However, it is very easy to extend to even higher orders. For this purpose, we should first express the equivalent mass as

$$M(\rho ,m_0)=\underset{i=0}{\overset{J}{}}c_i\rho ^i,$$
(97)
where $`J`$ is an integer. It’s value depends on to which order we would like to expand. In the case we have just treated, $`J=3`$.

The initial values for

$$M^{(i)}\frac{^iM}{\rho ^i}|_{\rho =\rho _0}(i=0,\mathrm{},J1)$$
(98)
are solved from

$$(3\rho _0)^i\frac{d^i}{d\rho ^i}\left[\frac{ϵ_\text{N}(M,\rho )}{\rho }\right]|_{\rho =rho_0}=K_i,(i=0\mathrm{}J1),$$
(99)
where $`K_0=M_\text{N}+E_\text{b},K_1=0,K_2=K`$. If $`J>3`$, we should also know the information on $`K_3,K_4`$ et al.. The coefficients $`c_i`$ $`(i=1\mathrm{}J)`$ are obtained by solving

$$\underset{i=k}{\overset{J}{}}\frac{i!}{(ik)!}c_i\rho _{0}^{}{}_{}{}^{i}=M^{(k)},(k=0\mathrm{}J1).$$
(100)
And the quark condensate is

$$\frac{\overline{q}q_\rho }{\overline{q}q_0}=1\frac{\rho }{\rho ^{}}f\left(\frac{p_\text{f}}{M}\right)\left[1\underset{i=1}{\overset{J}{}}(3i1)a_i\left(\frac{\rho }{\rho ^0}\right)^i\right].$$
(101)
Here the relation between $`a_i`$ and $`c_i`$ is still given by Eq. (84).

## IV Summary

We have presented a new formalism for the calculation of the in-medium chiral condensates. The key point of this scheme is to obtain an equivalent mass by solving a differential equation. The main advantage is that one does not need to make further assumptions on the derivatives of model parameters with respect to the quark current mass.

As an application of this method, we have successfully reproduced the normally accepted model-independent result in nuclear matter. We also showed that there is a similar expression for the chiral condensate in quark matter. It is found that the pion-nucleon sigma term is six times the average light quark current mass if the two decreasing speed is equal.

For quark matter at higher densities, we adopted a QCD-like interaction to solve our differential equation, which shows that the condensate decreases linearly at lower densities. However, the decreasing speed is slowed at higher densities, compared with the linear extrapolation. For some values of the parameters, it can finally vanish, while for other values it may saturate and even increase.

We have also shown that the incompressibility $`K`$ should not be less than 265 MeV to give the correct nuclear binding energy in this model. When $`K`$ is in the range of 265 to 326 MeV, the quark condensate monotonously decreases with increasing density. However, the critical density where the condensate vanishes is, generally, higher than that obtained by linear extrapolation. When $`K`$ is greater than 326 MeV, a hill for the condensate as function of density will appear, enhancing the chiral symmetry breaking, vanishing then for even higher densities.

## Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Prof. R. Machleidt for providing his latest version of the Dirac-Brueckner code. The supports from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (19905011, 10135030, 10275037, 10075057, 10147208), the CAS president foundation (E-26), the CAS key project (KJCX2-SW-N02), the university doctoral program foundation of the ministry of education of China (20010055012), and the FONDECYT of Chile (Proyecto 3010059 and 1010976) are also gratefully acknowledged.