The CFL phase and m_s: An effective field theory approach

We study the phase diagram of dense quark matter with an emphasis on the role of the strange quark mass. Our approach is based on two effective field theories (EFTs). The first is an EFT that describes quark quasi-particles near the Fermi surface. This EFT is valid at energies small compared to the chemical potential. The second is an EFT for the Goldstone modes in the paired phase. We find that in response to a non-zero strange quark mass the CFL phase first undergoes a transition to a kaon condensed phase, and then to a gapless phase with a non-zero Goldstone boson current.Comment: 26 pages, to appear in ``Pairing in fermionic systems: Basic concepts and modern applications", Series on Advances in Quantum Many-Body Theory, Vol. 8, World Scientific Publishing, Singapor

Instantons and the Large N_c Limit of QCD

We summarize our current understanding of instantons in the large N_c limit of QCD. We also present some recent results from simulations of the instanton liquid in QCD for N_c>3.Comment: 10 pages; talk given at the Workshop on the Phenomenology of Large N_C QCD, ASU (Jan. 2002), to be published in the proceeding

Strange Goings on in Quark Matter

We review recent work on how the superfluid state of three flavor quark matter is affected by non-zero quark masses and chemical potentials.Comment: 7 pages. To appear in the proceedings of 6th Workshop on Non-Perturbative QCD, Paris, France, 5-9 Jun 200

From Equilibrium to Transport Properties of Strongly Correlated Fermi Liquids

We summarize recent results regarding the equilibrium and non-equilibrium behavior of cold dilute atomic gases in the limit in which the two body scattering length a goes to infinity. In this limit the system is described by a Galilean invariant (non-relativistic) conformal field theory. We discuss the low energy effective lagrangian appropriate to the limit a->infinity, and compute low energy coefficients using an epsilon-expansion. We also show how to combine the effective lagrangian with kinetic theory in order to compute the shear viscosity, and compare the kinetic theory predictions to experimental results extracted from the damping of collective modes in trapped Fermi gases.Comment: 12 pages; to appear in the proceedings of the 8th Conference on Continuous Advances in QCD, Minneapolis, Minnesota, May 15-18, 200