Domain wall QCD with physical quark masses

We present results for several light hadronic quantities ($f_pi$, $f_K$, $B_K$, $m_{ud}$, $m_s$, $t_0^{1/2}$, $w_0$) obtained from simulations of 2+1 flavor domain wall lattice QCD with large physical volumes and nearly-physical pion masses at two lattice spacings. We perform a short, O(3)%, extrapolation in pion mass to the physical values by combining our new data in a simultaneous chiral/continuum `global fit with a number of other ensembles with heavier pion masses. We use the physical values of $m_pi$, $m_K$ and $m_Omega$ to determine the two quark masses and the scale - all other quantities are outputs from our simulations. We obtain results with sub-percent statistical errors and negligible chiral and finite-volume systematics for these light hadronic quantities, including: $f_pi$ = 130.2(9) MeV; $f_K$ = 155.5(8) MeV; the average up/down quark mass and strange quark mass in the $bar {rm MS}$ scheme at 3 GeV, 2.997(49) and 81.64(1.17) MeV respectively; and the neutral kaon mixing parameter, $B_K$, in the RGI scheme, 0.750(15) and the $bar{rm MS}$ scheme at 3 GeV, 0.530(11).

Nucleon structure from 2+1 flavor domain wall QCD at nearly physical pion mass

The RBC and UKQCD collaborations have been investigating hadron physics in numerical lattice quantum chromodynamics (QCD) with (2+1) flavors of dynamical domain wall fermions (DWF) quarks that preserves continuum-like chiral and flavor symmetries. The strange quark mass is adjusted to physical value via reweighting and degenerate up and down quark masses are set as light as possible. In a recent study of nucleon structure we found a strong dependence on pion mass and lattice spatial extent in isovector axialvector-current form factors. This is likely the first credible evidence for the pion cloud surrounding nucleon. Here we report the status of nucleon structure calculations with a new (2+1)-flavor dynamical DWF ensembles with much lighter pion mass of 180 and 250 MeV and a much larger lattice spatial exent of 4.6 fm. A combination of the Iwasaki and dislocation-suppressing-determinant-ratio (I+DSDR) gauge action and DWF fermion action allows us to generate these ensembles at cutoff of about 1.4 GeV while keeping the residual breaking of chiral symmetry sufficiently small. Nucleon source Gaussian smearing has been optimized. Preliminary nucleon mass estimates are 0.98 and 1.05 GeV.

Nucleon structure from RBC/UKQCD 2+1 flavor DWF dynamical ensembles at a nearly physical pion mass

We report the status of nucleon structure calculations on the (2+1)-flavor dynamical domain-wall fermions ensembles with pion masses as low as 180 and 250 MeV on a lattice with about 4.6 fm spatial extent. A combination of the Iwasaki+dislocation- suppressing-determinant-ratio (I+DSDR) gauge action and DWF fermion action allows us to generate these ensembles at cutoff of about 1.4 GeV while keeping the residual mass small. Nucleon source Gaussian smearing has been optimized. Preliminary nucleon mass estimates are 0.98 and 1.05 GeV.

Nucleon structure functions from dynamical (2+1)-flavor domain wall fermions

We report lattice-volume independence of low moments of nucleon structure functions from the coarse RIKEN-BNL-Columbia (RBC) and UKQCD joint dynamical (2+1)-flavor domain-wall fermions (DWF) ensembles at the lattice cut off of (a^{-1}sim1.7) GeV. The isovector quark momentum fraction, (< x >_{u-d}), and helicity fraction, (< x >_{Delta u - Delta d}), both fully non-perturbatively renormalized are studied on two spatial volumes of ((sim {rm 2.7 fm})^3) and ((sim {rm 1.8 fm})^3). Their naturally renormalized ratio, (< x >_{u-d}/< x >_{Delta u - Delta d}), is not affected by any finite-size effect. It does not depend strongly on light quark mass and does agree well with the experiment. The respective absolute values, fully non-perturbatively renormalized, do not show any finite-size effect either. They show trending toward the respective experimental values at the lightest up- and down-quark mass. This trending down to the experimental values appears to be a real physical effect driven by lighter quarks. The observations are in contrast to the huge finite-size effect seen in the axial-current form factors.

On-shell Delta I = 3/2 kaon weak matrix elements with non-zero total momentum

We present our results for the on-shell Delta I = 3/2 kaon decay matrix elements using domain wall fermions and the DBW2 gauge action at one coarse lattice spacing corresponding to 1/a = 1.31 GeV in the quenched approximation. The on-shell matrix elements are evaluated in two different frames: the center-of-mass frame and non-zero total-momentum frame. We employ the formula proposed by Lellouch and Luscher in the center-of-mass frame, and its extension for non-zero total momentum frame to extract the infinite volume, on-shell, center-of-mass frame decay amplitudes. We determine the decay amplitude at the physical pion mass and momentum from the chiral extrapolation and an interpolation of the relative momentum using the results calculated in the two frames. We have obtained Re(A_2) = 1.66(23)(^{+48}_{-03})(^{+53}_{-0}) x 10^{-8} GeV and Im(A_2) = -1.181(26)(^{+141}_{-014})(^{+44}_{-0}) x 10^{-12} GeV at the physical point, using the data at the relatively large pion mass, m_pi > 0.35 GeV. The first error is statistic, and the second and third are systematic. The second error is estimated with several fits of the chiral extrapolation including (quenched) chiral perturbation formula at next to leading order using only lighter pion masses. The third one is estimated with an analysis using the lattice dispersion relation. The result of Re(A_2) is reasonably consistent with experiment.

Quark mass renormalization with non-exceptional momenta

Renormalization conditions imposed on quark bilinear vertex functions in the conventional RI/MOM scheme use exceptional momentum configurations. With practical values for the lattice cutoff, these vertex functions are contaminated with unwanted low energy physics (pion pole, zero modes, etc), which is a large source of systematic error. These effects can be reduced by using non-exceptional momenta. We discuss the quark mass renormalization with non-exceptional momenta using 2+1 flavor domain wall fermions based on a recently proposed RI/SMOM scheme.

QCD thermodynamics at zero and non-zero density

We present results on the QCD equation of state, obtained with two different improved dynamical staggered fermion actions and almost physical quark masses. Lattice cut-off effects are discussed in detail as results for three different lattice spacings are available now, i.e. results have been obtained on lattices with temporal extent of $N_tau=4,6$ and 8. Furthermore we discuss the Taylor expansion approach to non-zero baryon chemical potential by means of an expansion of the pressure. We use the expansion coefficients to calculate various fluctuations and correlations among hadronic charges. We find that the correlations reproduce the qualitative behavior of the resonance gas model below $T_c$ and start to agree with the free gas predictions for $Tgsim 1.5T_c$.

Status of 2+1 flavor, 32^3x64 domain wall fermion simulations

We describe details of 1/a ~ 2.2Gev, L ~ 3 fm dynamical domain wall fermion simulations which will allow us to do a more systematic continuum extrapolation in combination with existing simu- lations. Details of the simulations such as algorithm choices and machine performance, as well as results of basic measurements are presented. These configurations are presently being generated on the QCDOC machine at Edinburgh and the DOE QCDOC machine at Brookhaven as part of a joint project with LHPC.