Gluon excitations of the static-quark potential

Abstract

The spectrum of gluon excitations in the presence of a static quark-antiquark pair is presented. Our results are obtained from computer simulations of gluons on anisotropic space-time lattices using an improved gauge-field action. Measurements for quark-antiquark separations r ranging from 0.1 fm to 4 fm and for various orientations on the lattice are made. Discretization errors and finite volume effects are taken into account. Surprisingly, the spectrum does not exhibit the expected onset of the universal pi/r Goldstone excitations of the effective QCD string, even for r as large as 4 fm.