The topological long range order in QCD. Applications to heavy ion collisions and cosmology

Abstract

We argue that the local violation of P invariance in heavy ion collisions is a consequence of the long range topological order which is inherent feature of strongly coupled QCD. A similar phenomenon is known to occur in some topologically ordered condensed matter systems with a gap. We also discuss possible cosmological applications of this long range order in strongly coupled gauge theories. In particular, we argue that the de Sitter behaviour might be dynamically generated as a result of the long range order. In this framework the inflaton is an auxiliary field which effectively describes the dynamics of topological sectors in a gauge theory in the expanding universe, rather than a new dynamical degree of freedom.

Comments: Prepare for the proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on New Frontiers in Physics (ICNFP-2014), Kolymbari, Crete, 2014, 14 pages, 4 figures