Nucleon electromagnetic form factors in two-flavour QCD

We present results for the nucleon electromagnetic form factors, including the momentum transfer dependence and derived quantities (charge radii and magnetic moment). The analysis is performed using O(a) improved Wilson fermions in Nf=2 QCD measured on the CLS ensembles. Particular focus is placed on a systematic evaluation of the influence of excited states in three-point correlation functions, which lead to a biased evaluation, if not accounted for correctly. We argue that the use of summed operator insertions and fit ans\"atze including excited states allow us to suppress and control this effect. We employ a novel method to perform joint chiral and continuum extrapolations, by fitting the form factors directly to the expressions of covariant baryonic chiral effective field theory. The final results for the charge radii and magnetic moment from our lattice calculations include, for the first time, a full error budget. We find that our estimates are compatible with experimental results within their overall uncertainties.Comment: 22 pages, 10 figures, citations modifie

Two-photon physics

It is reviewed how Compton scattering sum rules relate low-energy nucleon structure quantities to the nucleon excitation spectrum. In particular, the GDH sum rule and recently proposed extensions of it will be discussed. These extensions are sometimes more calculationally robust, which may be an advantage when estimating the chiral extrapolations of lattice QCD results, such as for anomalous magnetic moments. Subsequently, new developments in our description of the nucleon excitation spectrum will be discussed, in particular a recently developed chiral effective field theory framework for the $\Delta(1232)$-resonance region. Within this framework, we discuss results on $N$ and $\Delta$ masses, the $\gamma N \Delta$ transition and the $\Delta$ magnetic dipole moment.Comment: 10 pages, prepared for proceedings of Symposium on 20 Years of Physics at the Mainz Mikrotro

Radiative corrections in K --> 3 pi decays

We investigate radiative corrections to K --> 3 pi decays. In particular, we extend the non-relativistic framework developed recently to include real and virtual photons and show that, in a well-defined power counting scheme, the results reproduce corrections obtained in the relativistic calculation. Real photons are included exactly, beyond the soft-photon approximation, and we compare the result with the latter. The singularities generated by pionium near threshold are investigated, and a region is identified where standard perturbation theory in the fine structure constant alpha may be applied. We expect that the formulae provided allow one to extract S-wave pi pi scattering lengths from the cusp effect in these decays with high precision.Comment: 57 pages, 17 figure

Neutron-proton mass difference in nuclear matter

Isospin-breaking effects in nuclear matter are studied in the framework of a medium-modified Skyrme model. The proposed effective Lagrangian incorporates both the medium influence of the surrounding nuclear environment on the single nucleon properties and an explicit isospin-breaking effect in the mesonic sector. The approach predicts that the neutron-proton mass difference decreases in isospin-symmetric nuclear matter but by a very small amount only.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, revised versio

Nucleon structure from mixed action calculations using 2+1 flavors of asqtad sea and domain wall valence fermions

We present high statistics results for the structure of the nucleon from a mixed-action calculation using 2+1 flavors of asqtad sea and domain wall valence fermions. We perform extrapolations of our data based on different chiral effective field theory schemes and compare our results with available information from phenomenology. We discuss vector and axial form factors of the nucleon, moments of generalized parton distributions, including moments of forward parton distributions, and implications for the decomposition of the nucleon spin.Comment: 68 pages, 47 figures. Main revision points: improved discussion of chiral fits and systematic uncertainties, several minor refinements. Accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.

Electromagnetic form factor of pion from N_f=2+1 dynamical flavor QCD

We present a calculation of the electromagnetic form factor of the pion in $N_f=2+1$ flavor lattice QCD. Calculations are made on the PACS-CS gauge field configurations generated using Iwasaki gauge action and Wilson-clover quark action on a $32^3\times64$ lattice volume with the lattice spacing estimated as $a=0.0907(13)$ fm at the physical point. Measurements of the form factor are made using the technique of partially twisted boundary condition to reach small momentum transfer as well as periodic boundary condition with integer momenta. Additional improvements including random wall source techniques and a judicious choice of momenta carried by the incoming and outgoing quarks are employed for error reduction. Analyzing the form factor data for the pion mass at $M_\pi \approx 411$ MeV and 296 MeV, we find that the NNLO SU(2) chiral perturbation theory fit yields $=0.441 \pm 0.046 {\rm fm}^2$ for the pion charge radius at the physical pion mass. Albeit the error is quite large, this is consistent with the experimental value of $0.452\pm 0.011 {\rm fm}^2$. Below $M_\pi\approx 300$ MeV, we find that statistical fluctuations in the pion two- and three-point functions become too large to extract statistically meaningful averages on a $32^3$ spatial volume. We carry out a sample calculation on a $64^4$ lattice with the quark masses close to the physical point, which suggests that form factor calculations at the physical point become feasible by enlarging lattice sizes to $M_\pi L\approx 4$.Comment: 28 pages, 14 figure

Generalized parton distributions of the pion in a Bethe-Salpeter approach

We calculate generalized parton distribution functions in a field theoretic formalism using a covariant Bethe-Salpeter approach for the determination of the bound-state wave function. We describe the procedure in an exact calculation in scalar Electrodynamics proving that the relevant corrections outside our scheme vanish. We extend the formalism to the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model, a realistic theory of the pion. We go in both cases beyond all previous calculations and discover that all important features required by general physical considerations, like symmetry properties, sum rules and the polynomiality condition, are explicitly verified. We perform a numerical study of their behavior in the weak and strong coupling limits.Comment: 19 pages, 21 eps figures, accepted for publication in EPJ

Determination of Vus: Recent Input from the Lattice

The two most precise determinations of the CKM matrix element V_us are based on the analyses of leptonic and semileptonic kaon decays. These studies also rely on the lattice QCD calculations of two hadronic parameters, namely the ratio of the kaon and pion decay constants, f_K+/f_pi+, and the kaon semileptonic vector form factor at zero momentum transfer, f_+(0). In this talk, I review the recent lattice results for these quantities, by showing that the sub-percent accuracy required by the phenomenological analyses has been reached by lattice QCD. As best estimates of the lattice calculations I quote f_K+/f_pi+ = 1.193(4) and f_+(0)=0.965(3). I also discuss some recent theoretical progress in the evaluation of the small, but phenomenologically relevant, SU(2) isospin breaking corrections.Comment: Kaon 2013 conference proceeding