Gauge topology and confinement: an update

In the instanton ensemble the fermionic zero modes collectivize and break chiral symmetry. Recent studies of resulting zero mode zone confirm its very small width and overall importance for lattice simulations. Confinement however has been related with completely different topological objects, the magnetic monopoles. Instanton constituents -- instanton dyons, discovered at nonzero holonomy by Pierre van Baal and others -- are able to explain both confinement and chiral symmetry breaking. The talk summarizes recent works deriving the instanton-dyon mutual interactions, and statistical studies of their ensemble. At high density the screening is robust enough to do it analytically, in the mean-field-type approach: we call this limit Dense Dyonic Plasma (DDP). Above $T_c$ the classical interaction between the dyons induce strong correlations and should be studied by direct numerical simulations. Those works are now in progress.Comment: This is a writeup for proceedings of the 9th International Workshop on Critical Point and Onset of Deconfinement - CPOD2014. A talk of similar structure and content has also been given at The 32nd International Symposium on Lattice Field Theory, Columbia University, New York, June 201

Emerging Theory of Strongly Coupled Quark-Gluon Plasma

RHIC data have shown robust collective flows, including recent spectacular ``conical flow'' from quenched jets: that confirms that QGP above the critical line is in a strongly coupled regime. One way to study Non-Abelian classical strongly coupled plasmas is via molecular dynamics, which was recently extended to plasmas with electric and magntic charges. First results on its transport (diffusion and viscosity) are reported. AdS/CFT correspondence is another actively pursuit approach to strong coupling regime: we review new results for heavy quark motion and even complete picture of conical flow, obtained from linearized gravity dual. Recent developments in (non-linearized) gravity aims at reproduction of the whole time-dependent picture of the explosion. We finally compare transport properties obtained from RHIC data to those obtained in MD and AdS/CFT.Comment: Written contribution: a talk at Yukawa Institute meeting (YUKIS) November 200

Deconfinement, Monopoles and New Phenomena in Heavy Ion Collisions

We discuss various manifestations of the "magnetic scenario" for the quark-gluon plasma viewed as a mixture of two plasmas, of electrically (quark and gluons) as well as magnetically charged quasiparticles. Near the deconfinement phase transition, $T\approx T_c$ very small density of free quarks should lead to negligible screening of electric field while magnetic screening remains strong. The consequence of this should be existence of a "corona" of the QGP, in a way similar to that of the Sun, in which electric fields influence propagation of perturbations and even form metastable flux tubes. The natural tool for its description is (dual) magnetohydrodynamics: among observable consequences is splitting of sound into two modes, with larger and smaller velocity. The latter can be zero, hinting for formation of pressure-stabilized flux tubes. Remarkably, recent experimental discoveries at RHIC show effects similar to expected for "corona structures". In dihadron correlation function with large-$p_t$ trigger there are a "cone" and a "hard ridge",while the so called "soft ridge" is a similar structure seen without hard trigger. They seem to be remnants of flux tubes, which -- contrary to naive expectations -- seem to break less often in near-$T_c$ matter than do confining strings in vacuum.Comment: Written version of talk given at "Shifmania" conference, June 2009, Minneapolis, related to 60-the birthday of Misha Shifma