We present an update on the QCD equation of state of the Wuppertal-Budapest Collaboration, extending our previous studies [JHEP 0601 (2006) 089, JHEP 1011 (2010) 077]. A Symanzik improved gauge and a stout-link improved staggered fermion action is utilized. We discuss partial quenching and present preliminary results for the fully dynamical charmed equation of state.
We study the effects of the addition of the charm quark on the QCD equation of state at zero and nonzero chemical potential on lattices with $N_t=6$. Our ensembles are quenched with respect to charm and the charm quark is a valence staggered quark. Along the trajectory of constant physics the ratio $m_s/m_c$ is kept constant after tuning the charm quark mass at a lattice spacing of about 0.09 fm. We find that the charm quark has a significant contribution to the equation of state at zero chemical potential already at temperatures between about $1.2T_c$ and $2T_c$. The additional contribution at nonzero chemical potential vanishes within the current statistical uncertainty.
The present paper concludes our investigation on the QCD equation of state with 2+1 staggered flavors and one-link stout improvement. We extend our previous study [JHEP 0601:089 (2006)] by choosing even finer lattices. Lattices with $N_t=6,8$ and 10 are used, and the continuum limit is approached by checking the results at $N_t=12$. A Symanzik improved gauge and a stout-link improved staggered fermion action is utilized. We use physical quark masses, that is, for the lightest staggered pions and kaons we fix the $m_pi/f_K$ and $m_K/f_K$ ratios to their experimental values. The pressure, the interaction measure, the energy and entropy density and the speed of sound are presented as functions of the temperature in the range $100 ...1000 textmd{MeV}$. We give estimates for the pion mass dependence and for the contribution of the charm quark. We compare our data to the equation of state obtained by the hotQCD collaboration.
We report on a continuum extrapolated result (arXiv:1309.5258) for the equation of state (EoS) of QCD with $N_f=2+1$ dynamical quark flavors and discuss preliminary results obtained with an additional dynamical charm quark ($N_f=2+1+1$). For all our final results, the systematics are controlled, quark masses are set to their physical values, and the continuum limit is taken using at least three lattice spacings corresponding to temporal extents up to $N_t=16$.
We present a new theoretical and practical strategy to renormalize non-perturbatively the energy-momentum tensor in lattice QCD based on the framework of shifted boundary conditions. As a preparatory step for the fully non-perturbative calculation, we apply the strategy at 1-loop order in perturbation theory determining the renormalization constants of both the gluonic and the fermionic components of the energy-momentum tensor. Using shifted boundary conditions, the entropy density of QCD is directly related to the expectation value of the space-time components of the renormalized energy-momentum tensor. We then discuss its practical implementation by numerical simulations of QCD with 3 flavours of Wilson quarks for temperatures between 2.5 GeV and 80 GeV.
We determine the equation of state of 2+1-flavor QCD with physical quark masses, in the presence of a constant (electro)magnetic background field on the lattice. To determine the free energy at nonzero magnetic fields we develop a new method, which is based on an integral over the quark masses up to asymptotically large values where the effect of the magnetic field can be neglected. The method is compared to other approaches in the literature and found to be advantageous for the determination of the equation of state up to large magnetic fields. Thermodynamic observables including the longitudinal and transverse pressure, magnetization, energy density, entropy density and interaction measure are presented for a wide range of temperatures and magnetic fields, and provided in ancillary files. The behavior of these observables confirms our previous result that the transition temperature is reduced by the magnetic field. We calculate the magnetic susceptibility and permeability, verifying that the thermal QCD medium is paramagnetic around and above the transition temperature, while we also find evidence for weak diamagnetism at low temperatures.