Fate of the inert three-flavor, spin-zero color-superconducting phases

Abstract

I investigate some of the inert phases in three-flavor, spin-zero color-superconducting quark matter: the CFL phase (the analogue of the B phase in superfluid ${}^3\mathrm{He}$), the A and A* phases, and the 2SC and sSC phases. I compute the pressure of these phases with and without the neutrality condition. It is shown that the 2SC phase is identical to the A* phase up to a color rotation. The CFL phase is the energetically favored phase except for a small region of intermediate densities where the 2SC/A* phase is favored.

Comments: 9 pages, 1 figure; the version accepted to publish in PRD