The spectrum of excited isovector mesons is studied using a 32^3 x 256 anisotropic lattice with u,d quark masses set to give a pion mass near 240 MeV. Results in the bosonic isovector nonstrange symmetry channels of zero total momentum are presented
using correlation matrices of unprecedented size. In addition to spatially-extended single-meson operators, large numbers of two-meson operators are used, involving a wide variety of light isovector, isoscalar, and strange meson operators of varying relative momenta. All needed Wick contractions are efficiently evaluated using a stochastic method of treating the low-lying modes of quark propagation that exploits Laplacian Heaviside quark-field smearing. Level identification is discussed.
Progress in computing the spectrum of excited baryons and mesons in lattice QCD is described. Large sets of spatially-extended hadron operators are used. The need for multi-hadron operators in addition to single-hadron operators is emphasized, necess
itating the use of a new stochastic method of treating the low-lying modes of quark propagation which exploits Laplacian Heaviside quark-field smearing. A new glueball operator is tested, and computing the mixing of this glueball operator with a quark-antiquark operator and multiple two-pion operators is shown to be feasible.
A new method of stochastically estimating the low-lying effects of quark propagation is proposed which allows accurate determinations of temporal correlations of single-hadron and multi-hadron operators in lattice QCD. The method is well suited for c
alculations in large volumes. Contributions involving quark propagation connecting hadron sink operators at the same final time can be handled in a straightforward manner, even for a large number of final time slices. The method exploits Laplacian Heaviside (LapH) smearing. ZN noise is introduced in a novel way, and variance reduction is achieved using judiciously-chosen noise dilution projectors. The method is tested using isoscalar mesons in the scalar, pseudoscalar, and vector channels, and using the two-pion system of total isospin I=0,1,2 on large anisotropic 24^3 x 128 lattices with spatial spacing a_s~0.12 fm and temporal spacing a_t~0.034 fm for pion masses mpi~390 and 240 MeV.
