Experimental Signatures for Identifying Distinct Origins of Color Field Generation

Abstract

Signatures for non-abelian dynamics have long been central to QCD and QGP. Equally important are they in spin systems and laser-plasma interactions, where they emerge as effective interactions. Distinguishing experimentally gauge inequivalent sources (and hence potentials) that produce the same field tensor is one major task in this endeavour. As a step in this direction, this paper investigates how physically distinct sources which produce the same color electric field (uniform and constant) may be distinguished experimentally in a gauge-invariant manner. We first study the motion of a test particle in such fields and show that the resultant trajectories are counterintuitive. We then examine the radiation emitted - both gluonic and photonic and show that each source (independent non-abelian configuration) leaves a unique signature in the energy spectra, laying the ground for application to specific physical systems.