Topology and Staggered Fermion Action Improvement

It is conventional wisdom that staggered fermions do not feel gauge field topology. However, the response of staggered fermion eigenmodes to the topology of the gauge field can depend quite sensitively on the way in which the staggered fermion action is improved. We study this issue using a variety of improved staggered quark actions. We observe that the separation between the ``would be'' zero modes and the non-chiral modes increases with the level of improvement. This enables the ``zero modes'' to be identified unambiguously. The distribution of the remaining non-chiral modes is compared with the predictions of Random Matrix Theory. Satisfactory agreement is obtained.Comment: Lattice 2004 (topology

The author replies

I respond to the Bernard et al. comment on my letter ``Chiral anomalies and rooted staggered fermions.''Comment: 3 pages. Rebuttal to arXiv:hep-lat/0603027. To appear in Physics Letters

Parity Realization in Lattice QCD with Ginsparg-Wilson Fermions

The Vafa-Witten arguments on the realization of parity and flavour symmetries in the QCD vacuum do not apply to two lattice regularizations of QCD which are able to reproduce the chiral anomaly: Wilson fermions and Ginsparg-Wilson fermions. We show here how using the last regularization one can get, from first principles, that the more standard order parameters for these symmetries take a vanishing vacuum expectation value for any number of flavours, if quarks have a non-vanishing mass.Comment: 14 pages. References adde

High-Precision c and b Masses, and QCD Coupling from Current-Current Correlators in Lattice and Continuum QCD

We extend our earlier lattice-QCD analysis of heavy-quark correlators to smaller lattice spacings and larger masses to obtain new values for the c mass and QCD coupling, and, for the first time, values for the b mass: m_c(3GeV,n_f=4)=0.986(6)GeV, alpha_msb(M_Z,n_f=5)=0.1183(7), and m_b(10GeV,n_f=5)=3.617(25)GeV. These are among the most accurate determinations by any method. We check our results using a nonperturbative determination of the mass ratio m_b(mu,n_f)/m_c(mu,n_f); the two methods agree to within our 1% errors and taken together imply m_b/m_c=4.51(4). We also update our previous analysis of alpha_msb from Wilson loops to account for revised values for r_1 and r_1/a, finding a new value alpha_\msb(M_Z,n_f=5)=0.1184(6); and we update our recent values for light-quark masses from the ratio m_c/m_s. Finally, in the Appendix, we derive a procedure for simplifying and accelerating complicated least-squares fits.Comment: 16 pages, 10 figures, 3 table

The Laplacian Gauge Gluon Propagator in SU(N_c)

We examine the gluon propagator in the Laplacian gauge in quenched lattice QCD as a function of the number of colours. We observe a weak dependence on $N_c$ over the whole momentum range. This implies an almost $N_c$-independent gluon pole mass in units of the string tension.Comment: 5 pages, 7 figures. A study of the gluon propagator in SU(4) for various lattice sizes was added. Extended version to appear in Phys. Rev.