14850664
Thermodynamic properties of a simple, confining model
Abstract We study the equilibrium thermodynamics of a simple, confining, DSE-model of 2-flavour QCD at finite temperature and chemical potential. The model has two phases: one characterised by confinement and dynamical chiral symmetry breaking; and the other by their absence. The phase boundary is defined by the zero of the vacuum-pressure difference between the confined and deconfined phases. Chiral symmetry restoration and deconfinement are coincident with the transition being of first order, except for μ =0, where it is second order. Nonperturbative modifications of the dressed-quark propagator persist into the deconfined domain and lead to a dispersion law modified by a dynamically-generated, momentum-dependent mass-scale. This entails that the Stefan-Boltzmann limit for the bulk thermodynamic quantities is attained only for large values of temperature and chemical potential.
14771019
Pair production and optical lasers.
Electron-positron pair creation in a standing wave is explored using a parameter-free quantum kinetic equation. Field strengths and frequencies corresponding to modern optical lasers induce a material polarization of the QED vacuum, which may be characterized as a plasma of e+e- quasiparticle pairs with a density of approximately 10(20) cm-3. The plasma vanishes almost completely when the laser field is zero, leaving a very small residual pair density n(r) which is the true manifestation of vacuum decay. The average pair density per period is proportional to the laser intensity but independent of the frequency nu. The density of residual pairs also grows with laser intensity but n(r) proportional to nu(2). With optical lasers at the forefront of the current generation, these dynamical QED vacuum effects can plausibly generate 5-10 observable two-photon annihilation events per laser pulse.
44004941
Analysis of chiral and thermal susceptibilities
We calculate the chiral and thermal susceptibilities for two confining Dyson-Schwinger equation models of QCD with two light flavors, a quantitative analysis of which yields the critical exponents {beta} and {delta} that characterize the second-order chiral symmetry restoration transition. The method itself is of interest, minimizing the influence of numerical noise in the calculation of the order parameter for chiral symmetry breaking near the critical temperature. For the more realistic of the two models we estimate T{sub c}{approx}153 MeV and the non-mean-field values {beta}=0.46{plus_minus}0.04, {delta}=4.3{plus_minus}0.3, and 1/({beta}{delta})=0.54{plus_minus}0.05, which we discuss in comparison with the results of other models. {copyright} {ital 1998} {ital The American Physical Society}
119344902
Valence quark distributions in the pion
We calculate the pion's valence-quark momentum-fraction probability distribution using a Dyson-Schwinger equation model. Valence quarks with an active mass of 0.30 GeV carry 71% of the pion's momentum at a resolving scale q{sub 0}=0.54 GeV=1/(0.37 fm). The shape of the calculated distribution is characteristic of a strongly bound system and, evolved from q{sub 0} to q=2 GeV, it yields first, second, and third moments in agreement with lattice and phenomenological estimates, and valence-quarks carrying 49% of the pion's momentum. However, pointwise there is a discrepancy between our calculated distribution and that hitherto inferred from parametrizations of extant pion-nucleon Drell-Yan data.
14279889
The distribution function of the strong non-equilibrium systems of particles and anti-particles created from vacuum by electromagnetic field
We investigate some details of the back reaction (BR) problem formulated on the basis of the kinetic approach of authors to description of vacuum pair production in a strong electromagnetic field (Schwinger’s mechanism). Here we study numerically an evolution on the distribution functions of strong non-equilibrium systems bosons and fermions. The realized analysis is shown the regular dynamics in an absence of BR mechanism is destroyed at its account. As the result some large-scale structure is arisen an a background of small-scale chaotic motions. A Back-Reaction (BR) problem has been studied intensively in recent years in both high energy particle physics and especially in early cosmology. For simplicity, in this contribution we do not take into account the non-Abelian structure of color electric fields and concentrate on the back-reaction problem in application only to strong electromagnetic fields. However, the characteristics considered and the region of the field parameters used are of interest for the flux tube model applications to hadronic processes. We restrict ourselves to a simplest situation of a time-dependent space-homogeneous field. Under these restrictions, the peculiarity of our approach is based on making use of the exact kinetic equation (KE) [1, 2] which describes the evolution process of particle-antiparticle pair creation and annihilation in strong fields with the full zero charge. Our approach to the BR problem is based on the following exact Vlasov-like KE for vacuum pair creation and annihilation processes in a strong time-dependent space-homogeneous electric field [1, 2] 1) df(~ P , t) dt = ∂f(~ P , t) ∂t + eE(t) ∂f(~ P , t) ∂P3(t) = S(~ P , t) , (1) ) We use the units h̄ = c = 1 and the metric is chosen to be g = diag(1,−1,−1,−1).
8421267
A DYNAMICAL, CONFINING MODEL AND HOT QUARK STARS
Abstract We explore the consequences of an equation of state (EOS) obtained in a confining Dyson–Schwinger equation model of QCD for the structure and stability of nonstrange quark stars at finite- T , and compare the results with those obtained using a bag-model EOS. Both models support a temperature profile that varies over the star's volume and the consequences of this are model independent. However, in our model the analogue of the bag pressure is ( T , μ )-dependent, which is not the case in the bag model. This is a significant qualitative difference and comparing the results effects a primary goal of elucidating the sensitivity of quark star properties to the form of the EOS.
118867010
Inferring the redshift distribution of the cosmic infrared background
Cross-correlating the Planck High Frequency Instrument (HFI) maps against quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) DR7, we estimate the intensity distribution of the Cosmic Infrared Background (CIB) over the redshift range 0 < z < 5.We detect redshift-dependent spatial cross-correlations between the two datasets using the 857, 545 and 353 GHz channels and we obtain upper limits at 217 GHz consistent with expectations. At all frequencies with detectable signal we infer a redshift distribution peaking around z ~ 1.2 and find the recovered spectrum to be consistent with emission arising from star forming galaxies. By assuming simple modified blackbody and Kennicutt relations, we estimate dust and star formation rate density as a function of redshift, finding results consistent with earlier multiwavelength measurements over a large portion of cosmic history. However, we note that, lacking mid-infrared coverage, we are not able to make an accurate determination of the mean temperature for the dust responsible for the CIB. Our results demonstrate that clustering-based redshift inference is a valuable tool for measuring the entire evolution history of the cosmic star formation rate from a single and homogeneous dataset.
118589337
Improved photometric redshifts via enhanced estimates of system response, galaxy templates and magnitude priors
Wide, deep photometric surveys require robust photometric redshift estimates (photo-z's) for studies of large-scale structure. These estimates depend critically on accurate photometry. We describe the improvements to the photometric calibration and the photo-z estimates in the Deep Lens Survey (DLS) from correcting three of the inputs to the photo-z calculation: the system response as a function of wavelength, the spectral energy distribution templates, and template prior probabilities as a function of magnitude. We model the system response with a physical model of the MOSAIC camera's CCD, which corrects a 0.1 magnitude discrepancy in the colours of type M2 and later stars relative to the SDSS z-band photometry. We provide our estimated z-band response function for the use of other surveys that used MOSAIC before its recent detector upgrade. The improved throughput curve, template set, and Bayesian prior lead to a 20 per cent reduction in photo-z scatter and a reduction of the bias by a factor of more than two. This paper serves as both a photo-z data release description for DLS and a guide for testing the quality of photometry and resulting photo-z's generally.
119232505
Cosmic shear results from the deep lens survey - I: Joint constraints on omega_m and sigma_8 with a two-dimensional analysis
We present a cosmic shear study from the Deep Lens Survey (DLS), a deep BVRz multi-band imaging survey of five 4 deg2 fields with two National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) 4 m telescopes at Kitt Peak and Cerro Tololo. For both telescopes, the change of the point-spread-function (PSF) shape across the focal plane is complicated, and the exposure-to-exposure variation of this position-dependent PSF change is significant. We overcome this challenge by modeling the PSF separately for individual exposures and CCDs with principal component analysis (PCA). We find that stacking these PSFs reproduces the final PSF pattern on the mosaic image with high fidelity, and the method successfully separates PSF-induced systematics from gravitational lensing effects. We calibrate our shears and estimate the errors, utilizing an image simulator, which generates sheared ground-based galaxy images from deep Hubble Space Telescope archival data with a realistic atmospheric turbulence model. For cosmological parameter constraints, we marginalize over shear calibration error, photometric redshift uncertainty, and the Hubble constant. We use cosmology-dependent covariances for the Markov Chain Monte Carlo analysis and find that the role of this varying covariance is critical in our parameter estimation. Our current non-tomographic analysis alone constrains the Ω M -σ8 likelihood contour tightly, providing a joint constraint of Ω M = 0.262 ± 0.051 and σ8 = 0.868 ± 0.071. We expect that a future DLS weak-lensing tomographic study will further tighten these constraints because explicit treatment of the redshift dependence of cosmic shear more efficiently breaks the Ω M -σ8 degeneracy. Combining the current results with the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe 7 year (WMAP7) likelihood data, we obtain Ω M = 0.278 ± 0.018 and σ8 = 0.815 ± 0.020.
54796299
Galaxy-Mass Correlations on 10 Mpc Scales in the Deep Lens Survey
We examine the projected correlation of galaxies with mass from small scales (<few hundred kpc), where individual dark matter halos dominate, out to 15 Mpc, where correlated large-scale structure dominates. We investigate these profiles as a function of galaxy luminosity and redshift. Selecting 0.8 million galaxies in the Deep Lens Survey, we use photometric redshifts and stacked weak gravitational lensing shear tomography out to radial scales of 1° from the centers of foreground galaxies. We detect correlated mass density from multiple halos and large-scale structure at radii larger than the virial radius and find the first observational evidence for growth in the galaxy-mass correlation on 10 Mpc scales with decreasing redshift and fixed range of luminosity. For a fixed range of redshift, we find a scaling of projected halo mass with rest-frame luminosity similar to previous studies at lower redshift. We control systematic errors in shape measurement and photometric redshift, enforce volume completeness through absolute magnitude cuts, and explore residual sample selection effects via simulations.
16575011
Spectroscopic Needs for Imaging Dark Energy Experiments
Ongoing and near-future imaging-based dark energy experiments are critically dependent upon photometric redshifts (a.k.a. photo-z's): i.e., estimates of the redshifts of objects based only on flux information obtained through broad filters. Higher-quality, lower-scatter photo-z's will result in smaller random errors on cosmological parameters; while systematic errors in photometric redshift estimates, if not constrained, may dominate all other uncertainties from these experiments. The desired optimization and calibration is dependent upon spectroscopic measurements for secure redshift information; this is the key application of galaxy spectroscopy for imaging-based dark energy experiments. Hence, to achieve their full potential, imaging-based experiments will require large sets of objects with spectroscopically-determined redshifts, for two purposes: Training: Objects with known redshift are needed to map out the relationship between object color and z (or, equivalently, to determine empirically-calibrated templates describing the rest-frame spectra of the full range of galaxies, which may be used to predict the color-z relation). The ultimate goal of training is to minimize each moment of the distribution of differences between photometric redshift estimates and the true redshifts of objects, making the relationship between them as tight as possible. The larger and more complete our "training set" of spectroscopic redshifts is, the smaller the RMS photo-z errors should be, increasing the constraining power of imaging experiments. Requirements: Spectroscopic redshift measurements for similar to 30,000 objects over >similar to 15 widely-separated regions, each at least similar to 20 arcmin in diameter, and reaching the faintest objects used in a given experiment, will likely be necessary if photometric redshifts are to be trained and calibrated with conventional techniques. Larger, more complete samples (i.e., with longer exposure times) can improve photo-z algorithms and reduce scatter further, enhancing the science return from planned experiments greatly (increasing the Dark Energy Task Force figure of merit by up to similar to 50%). Options: This spectroscopy will most efficiently be done by covering as much of the optical and near-infrared spectrum as possible at modestly high spectral resolution (lambda/Delta lambda > similar to 3000), while maximizing the telescope collecting area, field of view on the sky, and multiplexing of simultaneous spectra. The most efficient instrument for this would likely be either the proposed GMACS/MANIFEST spectrograph for the Giant Magellan Telescope or the OPTIMOS spectrograph for the European Extremely Large Telescope, depending on actual properties when built. The PFS spectrograph at Subaru would be next best and available considerably earlier, c. 2018; the proposed ngCFHT and SSST telescopes would have similar capabilities but start later. Other key options, in order of increasing total time required, are the WFOS spectrograph at TMT, MOONS at the VLT, and DESI at the Mayall 4 m telescope (or the similar 4MOST and WEAVE projects); of these, only DESI, MOONS, and PFS are expected to be available before 2020. Table 2-3 of this white paper summarizes the observation time required at each facility for strawman training samples. To attain secure redshift measurements for a high fraction of targeted objects and cover the full redshift span of future experiments, additional near-infrared spectroscopy will also be required; this is best done from space, particularly with WFIRST-2.4 and JWST. Calibration: The first several moments of redshift distributions (the mean, RMS redshift dispersion, etc.), must be known to high accuracy for cosmological constraints not to be systematics-dominated (equivalently, the moments of the distribution of differences between photometric and true redshifts could be determined instead). The ultimate goal of calibration is to characterize these moments for every subsample used in analyses - i.e., to minimize the uncertainty in their mean redshift, RMS dispersion, etc. - rather than to make the moments themselves small. Calibration may be done with the same spectroscopic dataset used for training if that dataset is extremely high in redshift completeness (i.e., no populations of galaxies to be used in analyses are systematically missed). Accurate photo-z calibration is necessary for all imaging experiments. Requirements: If extremely low levels of systematic incompleteness (<similar to 0.1%) are attained in training samples, the same datasets described above should be sufficient for calibration. However, existing deep spectroscopic surveys have failed to yield secure redshifts for 30-60% of targets, so that would require very large improvements over past experience. This incompleteness would be a limiting factor for training, but catastrophic for calibration. If <similar to 0.1% incompleteness is not attainable, the best known option for calibration of photometric redshifts is to utilize cross-correlation statistics in some form. The most direct method for this uses cross-correlations between positions on the sky of bright objects of known spectroscopic redshift with the sample of objects that we wish to calibrate the redshift distribution for, measured as a function of spectroscopic z. For such a calibration, redshifts of similar to 100,000 objects over at least several hundred square degrees, spanning the full redshift range of the samples used for dark energy, would be necessary. Options: The proposed BAO experiment eBOSS would provide sufficient spectroscopy for basic calibrations, particularly for ongoing and near-future imaging experiments. The planned DESI experiment would provide excellent calibration with redundant cross-checks, but will start after the conclusion of some imaging projects. An extension of DESI to the Southern hemisphere would provide the best possible calibration from cross-correlation methods for DES and LSST. We thus anticipate that our two primary needs for spectroscopy - training and calibration of photometric redshifts - will require two separate solutions. For ongoing and future projects to reach their full potential, new spectroscopic samples of faint objects will be needed for training; those new samples may be suitable for calibration, but the latter possibility is uncertain. In contrast, wide-area samples of bright objects are poorly suited for training, but can provide high-precision calibrations via cross-correlation techniques. Additional training/calibration redshifts and/or host galaxy spectroscopy would enhance the use of supernovae and galaxy clusters for cosmology. We also summarize additional work on photometric redshift techniques that will be needed to prepare for data from ongoing and future dark energy experiments. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.