Modern Dyson-Schwinger Equation Studies

We survey contemporary studies of hadrons and strongly interacting quarks using QCD's Dyson-Schwinger equations, addressing: aspects of confinement and dynamical chiral symmetry breaking; the hadron spectrum; hadron elastic and transition form factors, from small- to large-Q^2; parton distribution functions; the physics of hadrons containing one or more heavy quarks; and properties of the quark gluon plasma.

A phenomenological Dyson-Schwinger equation approach to QCD, formalised in terms of a QCD based model field theory, is used to calculate the electromagnetic charge radius of the pion. The contributions from the quark core and pion loop, as defined in this approach, are identified and compared. It is shown explicitly that the divergence of the charge radius in the chiral limit is due to the pion loop and that, at the physical value of the pion mass, this loop contributes less ...

Detailed investigations of the structure of hadrons are essential for understanding how matter is constructed from the quarks and gluons of QCD, and amongst the questions posed to modern hadron physics, three stand out. What is the rigorous, quantitative mechanism responsible for confinement? What is the connection between confinement and dynamical chiral symmetry breaking? And are these phenomena together sufficient to explain the origin of more than 98% of the mass of the o...

An overview of the theory and phenomenology of hadrons and QCD is provided from a Dyson-Schwinger equation viewpoint. Following a discussion of the definition and realisation of light-quark confinement, the nonperturbative nature of the running mass in QCD and inferences from the gap equation relating to the radius of convergence for expansions of observables in the current-quark mass are described. Some exact results for pseudoscalar mesons are also highlighted, with details...

A valuable approach to the analysis of hadron physics observables is provided by QCD's equations-of-motion; namely, the Dyson-Schwinger equations. Drawing from a diverse collection of predictions, we revisit: $\gamma \gamma^* \to$ neutral pseudoscalar transition form factors, their corresponding valence-quark distribution amplitudes and a recent result on the pion distribution functions.

The real-world properties of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) - the strongly-interacting piece of the Standard Model - are dominated by two emergent phenomena: confinement; namely, the theory's elementary degrees-of-freedom - quarks and gluons - have never been detected in isolation; and dynamical chiral symmetry breaking (DCSB), which is a remarkably effective mass generating mechanism, responsible for the mass of more than 98% of visible matter in the Universe. These phenomena ...

We apply Euclidean time methods to phenomenological Dyson-Schwinger models of hadrons. By performing a Fourier transform of the momentum space correlation function to Euclidean time and by taking the large Euclidean time limit, we project onto the lightest on-mass-shell hadron for given quantum numbers. The procedure, which actually resembles lattice gauge theory methods, allows the extraction of moments of structure functions, moments of light-cone wave functions and form fa...

In the framework of Dyson-Schwinger equations (DSE), we compute the $\gamma^*\gamma\to\pi^0$ transition form factor, $G(Q^2)$. For the first time, in a continuum approach to quantun chromodynamics (QCD), it was possible to compute $G(Q^2)$ on the whole domain of space-like momenta. Our result agrees with CELLO, CLEO and Belle collaborations and, with the well-known asymptotic QCD limit, $2f_\pi$. Our analysis unifies this prediction with that of the pion's valence-quark parto...

Almost 50 years after the discovery of gluons & quarks, we are only just beginning to understand how QCD builds the basic bricks for nuclei: neutrons, protons, and the pions that bind them. QCD is characterised by two emergent phenomena: confinement & dynamical chiral symmetry breaking (DCSB). They are expressed with great force in the character of the pion. In turn, pion properties suggest that confinement & DCSB are closely connected. As both a Nambu-Goldstone boson and a q...

Dyson-Schwinger equations furnish a Poincare' covariant framework within which to study hadrons. A particular feature is the existence of a nonperturbative, symmetry preserving truncation that enables the proof of exact results. Key to the DSE's efficacious application is their expression of the materially important momentum-dependent dressing of parton propagators at infrared length-scales, which is responsible for the magnitude of constituent-quark masses and the length-sca...