Exact Mesonic Eightfold Way From Dynamics and Confinement in Strongly Coupled Lattice QCD

We review our results on the exact determination of the mesonic eightfold way from first principles, directly from the quark-gluon dynamics. For this, we consider an imaginary-time functional integral formulation of 3 + 1 dimensional lattice QCD with Wilson action, three flavors, SU(3)f flavor symmetry and SU(3)c local gauge symmetry. We work in the strong coupling regime: a small hopping parameter κ>0 and a much smaller plaquette coupling β>0. By establishing a Feynman-Kac formula and a spectral representation to the two-meson correlation, we provide a rigorous connection between this correlation and the one-meson energy-momentum spectrum. The particle states can be labeled by the usual SU(3)f quantum numbers of total isospin I and its third-component I3, the quadratic Casimir C2 and, by a partial restoration of the continuous rotational symmetry on the lattice, as well as by the total spin J and its z–component Jz. We show that, up to near the two-meson energy threshold of ≈−4lnκ, the spectrum in the meson sector is given only by isolated dispersion curves of the eightfold way mesons. The mesons have all asymptotic mass of −2lnκ and, by deriving convergent expansions for the masses both in κ and β, we also show a κ4 mass splitting between the J=0,1 states. The splitting persists for β≠0. Our approach employs the decoupling of hyperplane method to uncover the basic excitations, complex analysis to determine the dispersion curves and a correlation subtraction method to show the curves are isolated. Using the latter and recalling our similar results for baryons, we also show confinement up to near the two-meson threshold.