Zeeman splitting and dynamical mass generation in Dirac semimetal ZrTe_5

With the support by the Thousand Talents Program and the National Natural Science Foundation of China,the research team led by Prof.Xiu Faxian（修发贤）at the State Key Laboratory of Surface Physics,Department of Physics,Fudan University,uncovered the dynamical mass generation in the Dirac semimetal ZrTe5,which was published in Nature Communications（2016,DOI:10.1038/NCOMMS12516）.

Non-Perturbative Analysis of Various Mass Generation by Gluonic Dressing Effect with the Schwinger-Dyson Formalism in QCD

As a topic of “quantum color dynamics”, we study various mass generation of colored particles and gluonic dressing effect in a non-perturbative manner, using the Schwinger-Dyson (SD) formalism in (scalar) QCD. First, we review dynamical quark-mass generation in QCD in the SD approach as a typical fermion-mass generation via spontaneous chiral-symmetry breaking. Second, using the SD formalism for scalar QCD, we investigate the scalar diquark, a bound-state-like object of two quarks, and its mass generation, which is clearly non-chiral-origin. Here, the scalar diquark is treated as an extended colored scalar field, like a meson in effective hadron models, and its effective size R is introduced as a form factor. As a diagrammatical difference, the SD equation for the scalar diquark has an additional 4-point interaction term, in comparison with the single quark case. The diquark size R is taken to be smaller than a hadron, R ~ 1 fm, and larger than a constituent quark, R ~ 0.3 fm. We find that the compact diquark with R ~ 0.3 fm has a large effective mass of about 900 MeV, and therefore such a compact diquark is not acceptable in effective models for hadrons. We also consider the artificial removal of 3- and 4-point interaction, respectively, to see the role of each term, and find that the 4-point interaction plays the dominant role of the diquark self-energy. From the above two different cases, quarks and diquarks, we guess that the mass generation of colored particles is a general result of non-perturbative gluonic dressing effect.

The gluon mass generation mechanism： A concise primer

We present a pedagogical overview of the nonperturbative mechanism that endows gluons with a dynamical mass. This analysis is performed based on pure Yang-Mills theories in the Landau gauge, within the theoretical framework that emerges from the combination of the pinch technique with the background field method. In particular, we concentrate on the Schwinger-Dyson equation satisfied by the gluon propagator and examine the necessary conditions for obtaining finite solutions within the infrared region. The role of seagull diagrams receives particular attention, as do the identities that enforce the cancellation of all potential quadratic divergences. We stress the necessity of introducing nonperturbative massless poles in the fully dressed vertices of the theory in order to trigger the Schwinger mechanism, and explain in detail the instrumental role of these poles in maintaining the Becchi-Rouet-Stora-Tyutin symmetry at every step of the mass-generating procedure. The dynamical equation governing the evolution of the gluon mass is derived, and its solutions are determined numerically following implementation of a set of simplifying assumptions. The obtained mass function is positive definite, and exhibits a power law running that is consistent with general arguments based on the operator product expansion in the ultraviolet region. A possible connection between confinement and the presence of an inflection point in the gluon propagator is briefly discussed.

Calculation of Particle-Number Susceptibility of QED3 at Finite Temperature

Based on the external field approach and the differential form of Ward identity, we derive a more compact formula for the particle-number susceptibility in QED3 at finite temperature. Using the zero frequency approximation the numerical value of the particle-number susceptibility is calculated in the Dyson-Schwinger approach for the case that the number of fermion flavours equals one and two, respectively. An enhanced fluctuation of the particlenumber density is observed across the transition temperature, which should be an essential characteristic of chiral phase transition in QED3.