Aspects of cold dense quark matter

Abstract

This thesis is devoted to properties of quark matter at high density and (comparatively) low temperature, which might exist in the interior of compact stars. The specific heat and the quark self energy in normal quark matter are discussed in detail. In particular higher order corrections to the known leading order results are obtained. Also the phenomenon of color superconductivity is discussed, with particular emphasis on the proof of gauge independence of the fermionic quasiparticle dispersion laws. Moreover, the expectation value of the gluon field in the 2SC and CFL phase is computed at leading order.