Topological charge and cooling scales in pure SU(2) lattice gauge theory

Abstract

Using Monte Carlo simulations with overrelaxation, we have equilibrated lattices up to $\beta =2.928$, size $60^4$, for pure SU(2) lattice gauge theory with the Wilson action. We calculate topological charges with the standard cooling method and find that they become more reliable with increasing $\beta$ values and lattice sizes. Continuum limit estimates of the topological susceptibility $\chi$ are obtained of which we favor ${\chi }^{1/4}/T_c=0.643(12)$, where $T_c$ is the SU(2) deconfinement temperature. Differences between cooling length scales in different topological sectors turn out to be too small to be detectable within our statistical errors.

Comments: 8 pages, 8 figures, added investigation of topological susceptibility