Long-distance behavior of $q\bar{q}$ color dependent potentials at finite temperature

Abstract

SU(3) heavy quark potentials at finite temperature are studied with quenched lattice QCD using the stochastic gauge-fixing method. In addition to the standard color average channel, we investigate $q\bar{q}$ potentials in singlet and octet channels. % We obtain clear signals in all cases. The singlet $q\bar{q}$ channel yields an attractive force, while the octet $q\bar{q}$ potential is repulsive; the corresponding color average channel also results in an attractive force. %As the temperature increases, these forces are weakened and As the temperature increases, these forces become weak and their variations are very small; at $T/T_c=1.8-5.6$, % the singlet attractive force is not so weakened even for long distances. the singlet attractive force survives over $R \sim 1/T$. The singlet and octet potentials calculated with this algorithm have a small gauge dependence when the gauge parameter $\alpha$ is changed from 0.6 to 1.3.