Meson supercurrent state in high-density QCD.
The ground state of three flavor quark matter at asymptotically large density is believed to be the color-flavor-locked (CFL) phase. At nonasymptotic density the effect of the nonzero strange quark mass cannot be neglected. If the strange quark mass exceeds m(s) approximately m(u)(1/3)delta(2/3), the CFL state becomes unstable toward the formation of a neutral kaon condensate. Recently, several authors discovered that for m(s) approximately (2deltap(F))(1/2) the CFL state contains gapless fermions, and that the gapless modes lead to an instability in current-current correlation functions. Using an effective theory of the CFL state, we demonstrate that this instability can be resolved by the formation of a meson supercurrent, analogous to Migdal's p-wave pion condensate. This state has a nonzero meson current that is canceled by a backflow of gapless fermions.
Department of Physics, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina 27695, USA.
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