# Quark gluon plasma as a strongly coupled color-Coulombic plasma

We show that the extensively studied equation of state (EOS) of strongly coupled QED plasma fits the recent lattice EOS data of gluon plasma remarkably well, with appropriate modifications to take account of color degrees of freedom and running coupling constant. Hence we conclude that the quark gluon plasma near the critical temperature is a strongly coupled color-Coulombic plasma.

PACS Nos : 12.38.Mh, 12.38.Gc, 05.70.Ce, 25.75.+r, 52.25.Kn   
Keywords : Equation of state, quark gluon plasma, strongly coupled plasma Quark gluon plasma (QGP), the deconfined state of quarks and gluons, is a prediction of quantum chromodynamics (QCD). In search of QGP, experiments are on at CERN, BNL etc. where heavy ions are accelerated to relativistic energies and made to collide. At sufficiently large energy ($`>`$ few GeV), the fireball formed by collision may be QGP which then expands, cools and freezes out into hadrons. These hadrons, photons, leptons etc. are detected and analysed to see whether QGP is formed or not. The expansion of QGP, generally described by relativistic hydrodynamics, affects the experimental observations. In the description of hydrodynamics, the EOS of QGP is needed to complete the set of fluid equations. At present all analysis of experimental results are based on ideal equation of state where quarks and gluons are noninteracting and pressure or energy density are propotional to the $`4^{th}`$ power of temperature. In the theoretical calculations of various signatures of QGP, it is assumed that QGP is an ideal plasma.

However, the recent lattice simulation results show that gluon plasma is not ideal and is nonideal even upto five times the critical temperature ($`T_c`$) . There were lot of attempts  to explain this numerical experiment based on the properties of QCD, confinement and asymptotic freedom, properties of plasma, etc. All of them, so far, not able to explain the data satisfactorily.

In Ref. , they tried to fit the lattice results assuming Coulombic interaction with running coupling constant, confinement in the form of bag constant and low momentum cut-off in the evaluation of partition function. In Ref. , gluons are assumed as quasi-particles with mass propotional to plasma frequency. Here also a modified, temperature dependent, running coupling constant is used to fit the old lattice results of Ref. . As we will see it does not fit the recent more refined data . Earlier we  had assumed Cornel potential interaction , Coulomb + confinement, between quark and antiquark and used Mayer’s cluster expansion method to derive EOS. This EOS was used to fit lattice results on gluon plasma with partial success. Especially near the critical temperature fitting was not good. We suspected that it might be due to the fact that our theory was for weakly interacting system and hence valid only in the high temperature limit. To explain the lattice results near $`T_c`$ we need a theory of strongly interacting system. In other words, near $`T_c`$ QGP may be a strongly coupled plasma. This is exactly what we find in this letter, namely, QGP is a strongly coupled color Coulombic plasma.

Generally when we say plasma, it is a quasi neutral system of charged particles which exhibits collective effects. The so called plasma parameter $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, which is the ratio of average potential energy to average kinetic energy of particles, is assumed to be weak ($`<<1`$). Lot of studies in plasma such as plasma waves, instabilities and other collective effects are in this range of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. For $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ close to 1 and above, it is a strongly coupled plasma (SCP) which modifies various properties of plasma . We see that QGP is also a strongly coupled plasma near $`T_c`$. Partially analytic and partially numerical calculations of SCP do exist in the literature . In particular, EOS of SCP is extensively studied and parameterized as a function of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$.

Let us now discuss about QGP. We take QGP as a deconfined, quasi-color-neutral system of quarks, antiquarks and gluons with color Coulombic mutual interactions. It is similar to QED plasma apart from few modifications due to color degrees of freedom. It is charactorized by plasma parameter,

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }\frac{<PE>}{<KE>}=\frac{\frac{4}{3}\frac{\alpha _s}{r_{av}}}{T},$$
(1)   
where we have taken the well known Coulombic interactions used in hadron spectroscopy . The typical value of $`\alpha _s0.5`$, $`r_{av}1fm`$ and near the critical temperature, $`T_c200MeV`$, we estimate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }2/3`$. Hence QGP is a strongly coupled plasma. Compared to QED, the fine structure constant, $`\alpha `$, is replaced by $`4\alpha _s/3`$ in Coulomb interaction term. $`r_{av}`$ may be estimated as $`r_{av}=(3/4\pi n)^{1/3}`$ and hence

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }=\left(\frac{4\pi n}{3}\right)^{1/3}\frac{4}{3}\frac{\alpha _s}{T},$$
(2)   
where ’$`n`$’ is the number density. Taking $`na_fT^3`$ we get

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }\left(\frac{4\pi a_f}{3}\right)^{1/3}\frac{4}{3}\alpha _s,$$
(3)   
$`a_f`$ is a constant which depends on degrees of freedom. As we discussed earlier there exists EOS for strongly coupled Coulombic system as a function of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. Since QGP is also a SCP with $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ given by Eq. (3), we modify QED nonrelativistic energy density, $`\epsilon _{QED}=(3/2+u_{ex}(\mathrm{\Gamma }))nT`$ for strongly coupled relativistic QGP (SCQGP) as

$$\epsilon =(3+u_{ex}(\mathrm{\Gamma }))nT,$$
(4)   
where

$$u_{ex}(\mathrm{\Gamma })=\frac{u_{ex}^{Abe}(\mathrm{\Gamma })+3\times 10^3\mathrm{\Gamma }^{5.7}u_{ex}^{OCP}(\mathrm{\Gamma })}{1+3\times 10^3\mathrm{\Gamma }^{5.7}}.$$
(5)   
Here we have taken same $`u_{ex}^{Abe}`$ and $`u_{ex}^{OCP}`$ as used in SCP and are given by

$$u_{ex}^{Abe}(\mathrm{\Gamma })=\frac{\sqrt{3}}{2}\mathrm{\Gamma }^{3/2}3\mathrm{\Gamma }^3\left[\frac{3}{8}\mathrm{ln}(3\mathrm{\Gamma })+\frac{\gamma }{2}\frac{1}{3}\right],$$
(6)   
$$u_{ex}^{OCP}=0.898004\mathrm{\Gamma }+0.96786\mathrm{\Gamma }^{1/4}+0.220703\mathrm{\Gamma }^{1/4}0.86097.$$
(7)   
$`u_{ex}^{Abe}`$ was derived by Abe  exactly in the giant cluster-expansion theory. $`\gamma =0.57721\mathrm{}`$ is Euler’s constant. $`u_{ex}^{OCP}`$ was evaluated by computer simulation of one component plasma (OCP), where a single species of charged particles embedded in a uniform background of neutralizing charges. $`u_{ex}(\mathrm{\Gamma })`$ is derived for strongly coupled Coulombic plasma and we believe that it should be valid for any Coulombic plasma except a change, $`\alpha 4\alpha _s/3`$ in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, for color Coulombic plasma. Finally, we get,

$$e(\mathrm{\Gamma })\frac{\epsilon }{\epsilon _s}=1+\frac{1}{3}u_{ex}(\mathrm{\Gamma }),$$
(8)   
where $`\epsilon _s3a_fT^4`$, energy density of ideal QGP gas. Using the relation

$$\epsilon =T\frac{P}{T}P,$$
(9)   
we get the pressure

$$p(T)\frac{P}{P_s}=\left(\frac{P_c}{a_fT_c}+3_{T_c}^T𝑑\tau \tau ^2e(\tau )\right)/T^3,$$
(10)   
where $`P_sa_fT^4`$ and $`P_c`$ is the pressure at critical temperature $`T_c`$. Temperature dependence of $`e(\mathrm{\Gamma })`$ seen in lattice data can only come from $`\alpha _s`$ in our model by using running coupling constant $`\alpha _s(T)`$. Let us use the running coupling constant $`\alpha _s^L(T)`$ used in the lattice calculation  which may be obtained from the modified second order scaling relation,

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_L}{N_\tau T\lambda (\beta )}=(8\pi ^2\beta /33)^{51/121}\mathrm{exp}(4\pi ^2\beta /33),$$
(11)   
where $`\beta 6/g^2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_L,N_\tau `$ are lattice parameters which may be replaced in terms of $`T_c`$ in above equation to get,

$$\frac{T}{T_c}=(\beta _c/\beta )^{51/121}\mathrm{exp}(4\pi ^2(\beta _c\beta )/33),$$
(12)   
where we have taken $`\lambda (\beta )\lambda (\beta _c)`$, for simplicity. Also it follows from Ref.  that $`\lambda (\beta )`$ varies slowly as a function of $`\beta `$. After some algebra, we get,

$$\alpha _s^L(t)=\frac{2\pi }{11\left(\mathrm{ln}(t/t_0)+\frac{51}{121}\mathrm{ln}(12\pi /33\alpha _s^L(t))\right)},$$
(13)   
where $`tT/T_c`$ and $`t_0`$ is

$$t_0=(8\pi ^2\beta _c/33)^{51/121}\mathrm{exp}(4\pi ^2\beta _c/33).$$
(14)   
$`\alpha _s^L(t)`$ for given $`t`$ is obtained by solving Eq. (13). $`t_0`$ or $`\beta _c`$ is only one parameter and adjusted to get the best fitting to lattice data . In Fig. 1, we plotted $`e(t)`$, Eq. (8) and $`p(t)`$,

$$p(t)\frac{P}{P_s}=\left(p_c+3_1^t𝑑\tau \tau ^2e(\tau )\right)/t^3,$$
(15)   
and obtained a remarkable good fit to lattice data  for $`t_0=.5763`$ or $`\beta _c=.57`$. We have used $`a_f=16\pi ^2/90`$ which is for gluons. However, the value of $`\beta _c`$ is an order of magnitude smaller than that of lattice results. For small value of $`\alpha _s`$, $`\alpha _s^L(t)`$ may be approximated as

$$\alpha _s^L(t)\frac{2\pi }{11\mathrm{ln}(t/t_0)}\left(1\frac{51}{121}\frac{\mathrm{ln}(2\mathrm{ln}(t/t0))}{\mathrm{ln}(t/t0)}\right),$$
(16)   
or

$$\alpha _s^L(t)\frac{2\pi }{11\mathrm{ln}(t/t_0)}.$$
(17)   
The last expression is similar to the running coupling constant used in Ref.  where $`t_0\mathrm{\Lambda }/T_c`$ and also in Ref.  where $`t_0\mathrm{\Lambda }/\pi T_c`$. $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the QCD scale parameter. For $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=200MeV`$ we get $`T_c=347MeV`$ and $`T_c=110MeV`$ respectively. We have also plotted

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=\frac{\epsilon 3P}{3a_fT^4},$$
(18)   
a measure of nonidealness, and $`c_s^2`$. A reasonable good fit to lattice data is obtained, as shown in Fig. 2, except very close to $`T_c`$. In Fig. 3, we plotted $`\alpha _s^L(t)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(t)`$ as a function of $`t`$. We see that even at $`T=5T_c`$, gluon plasma is strongly coupled plasma and running coupling constant is not small.

It is interesting to compare earlier few theories with our present theory. In Fig. 4, the best fits for $`p(t)`$ for three models (Ref. , Ref.  and present model) are plotted. As we see the fitting of lattice data with the theory improves as we go from quasi-particle theory, our earlier result and present result.

In conclusion, we obtained a remarkably good fit to the recent lattice result  using EOS of strongly coupled plasma of QED  with a modification for color degrees of freedom and with a running coupling constant which was used in lattice calculations. Hence we conclude that QGP is a strongly coupled Coulombic plasma of color charges. Just like in SCP, SCQGP may have a dramatic effects on various signatures, collective effects and other properties. They need to be recalculated before we make confirmation of QGP in relativistic heavy ion collisions. For e.g., screening length decreases rapidly near critical temperature and we may have serious consequences in $`J/\psi `$ suppression results.

I thank P. K. Kaw and J. C. Parikh for useful discussions on strongly coupled plasma.