No Arabic abstract
Precision computation of hadronic physics with lattice QCD is becoming feasible. The last decade has seen percent-level calculations of many simple properties of mesons, and the last few years have seen calculations of baryon masses, including the nucleon mass, accurate to a few percent. As computational power increases and algorithms advance, the precise calculation of a variety of more demanding hadronic properties will become realistic. With this in mind, I discuss the current lattice QCD calculations of generalized parton distributions with an emphasis on the prospects for well-controlled calculations for these observables as well. I will do this by way of several examples: the pion and nucleon form factors and moments of the nucleon parton and generalized-parton distributions.
The electromagnetic form factors of the proton and the neutron are computed within lattice QCD using simulations with quarks masses fixed to their physical values. Both connected and disconnected contributions are computed. We analyze two new ensembles of $N_f = 2$ and $N_f = 2 + 1 + 1$ twisted mass clover-improved fermions and determine the proton and neutron form factors, the electric and magnetic radii, and the magnetic moments. We use several values of the sink-source time separation in the range of 1.0 fm to 1.6 fm to ensure ground state identification. Disconnected contributions are calculated to an unprecedented accuracy at the physical point. Although they constitute a small correction, they are non-negligible and contribute up to 15% for the case of the neutron electric charge radius.
The magnetic dipole, the electric quadrupole and the Coulomb quadrupole amplitudes for the transition $gamma Nto Delta$ are evaluated both in quenched lattice QCD at $beta=6.0$ and using two dynamical Wilson fermions simulated at $beta=5.6$. The dipole transition form factor is accurately determined at several values of momentum transfer. On the lattices studied in this work, the electric quadrupole amplitude is found to be non-zero yielding a negative value for the ratio, $ R_{EM}$, of electric quadrupole to magnetic dipole amplitudes at three values of momentum transfer.
The magnetic dipole, the electric quadrupole and the Coulomb quadrupole amplitudes for the transition gamma Nto Delta are calculated in quenched lattice QCD at beta=6.0 with Wilson fermions. Using a new method combining an optimal combination of interpolating fields for the $Delta$ and an overconstrained analysis, we obtain statistically accurate results for the dipole form factor and for the ratios of the electric and Coulomb quadrupole amplitudes to the magnetic dipole amplitude, R_{EM} and R_{SM}, up to momentum transfer squared 1.5 GeV^2. We show for the first time using lattice QCD that both R_{EM} and R_{SM} are non-zero and negative, in qualitative agreement with experiment and indicating the presence of deformation in the N- Delta system.
Lattice simulations of QCD have produced precise estimates for the masses of the lowest-lying hadrons which show excellent agreement with experiment. By contrast, lattice results for the vector and axial vector form factors of the nucleon show significant deviations from their experimental determination. We present results from our ongoing project to compute a variety of form factors with control over all systematic uncertainties. In the case of the pion electromagnetic form factor we employ partially twisted boundary conditions to extract the pion charge radius directly from the linear slope of the form factor near vanishing momentum transfer. In the nucleon sector we focus specifically on the possible contamination from contributions of higher excited states. We argue that summed correlation functions offer the possibility of eliminating this source of systematic error. As an illustration of the method we discuss our results for the axial charge, gA, of the nucleon.
We present results on the nucleon axial form factors within lattice QCD using two flavors of degenerate twisted mass fermions. Volume effects are examined using simulations at two volumes of spatial length $L=2.1$ fm and $L=2.8$ fm. Cut-off effects are investigated using three different values of the lattice spacings, namely $a=0.089$ fm, $a=0.070$ fm and $a=0.056$ fm. The nucleon axial charge is obtained in the continuum limit and chirally extrapolated to the physical pion mass enabling comparison with experiment.