Vector dominance, one flavored baryons, and QCD domain walls from the "hidden" Wess-Zumino term

We further explore a recent proposal that the vector mesons in QCD have a special role as Chern-Simons fields on various QCD objects such as domain walls and the one flavored baryons. We compute contributions to domain wall theories and to the baryon current coming from a generalized Wess-Zumino term including vector mesons. The conditions that lead to the expected Chern-Simons terms and the correct spectrum of baryons, coincide with the conditions for vector meson dominance. This observation provides a theoretical explanation to the phenomenological principle of vector dominance, as well as an experimental evidence for the identification of vector mesons as the Chern-Simons fields. By deriving the Chern-Simons theories directly from an action, we obtain new results about QCD domain walls. One conclusion is the existence of a first order phase transition between domain walls as a function of the quarks' masses. We also discuss applications of our results to Seiberg duality between gluons and vector mesons and provide new evidence supporting the duality.

Skyrmions, Quantum Hall Droplets, and one current to rule them all

We introduce a novel Skyrme-like conserved current in the effective theory of pions and vector mesons based on the idea of hidden local symmetry. The associated charge is equivalent to the skyrmion charge for any smooth configuration. In addition, there exist singular configurations that can be identified as N_f=1Nf=1 baryons charged under the new symmetry. Under this identification, the vector mesons play the role of the Chern-Simons vector fields living on the quantum Hall droplet that forms the N_f=1Nf=1 baryon. We propose that this current is the correct effective expression for the baryon current at low energies. This proposal gives a unified picture for the two types of baryons and allows them to continuously transform one to the other in a natural way. In addition, Chern-Simons dualities on the droplet can be interpreted as a result of Seiberg-like duality between gluons and vector mesons.

Skyrmions and effective Lagrangians

The need to model quantum chromodynamics (QCD) at low energy is emphasized. An outline of the1/NC expansion of QCD, for large NC, shows the deep link between the Skyrme effective Lagrangian and QCD. The Skyrme model, built from the nonlinear σ model plus a stabilizer term related to vector dominance, is briefly described. The model satisfies like QCD chiral symmetry. We illustrate how the gauged Wess–Zumino action demonstrates that the topological current can be identified with the baryon current. We recall how one can show that the topological soliton is a fermion for odd NC. An example of an effective Lagrangian, built from π and low-mass vector mesons, ω, ρ, and A1 fields, is given. It describes rather well low-energy meson and baryon physics. Predictions of effective Lagrangians of the Skyrme type on meson–meson, meson–baryon, and baryon–baryon scatterings at low energy are depicted. A two-phase chiral symmetric model, the chiral bag, is introduced. It contains an inner core of confined quarks and gluons surrounded by meson fields in the topological configuration of a Skyrmion. It can describe nuclei from the low- to the high-energy range.