Relation between the chiral and deconfinement phase transitions

Lattice QCD simulations at finite temperature have shown that the chiral phase transition in the chiral limit and the deconfinement phase transition in the quenched limit are continuously connected. I emphasize the nontriviality of this result and propose an unconventional scenario which naturally explains the existing lattice data. The continuity of the two phase transitions is a manifestation of the familiar glueball-meson mixing, which can be traced back to the properties of QCD at zero temperature.Comment: 5 pages, talk given at Strong and Electroweak Matter 2004 (SEWM04), Helsinki, Finland, 16-19 Jun 200

Separating hard and soft scales in hard processes in a QCD plasma

We present a picture of hard processes in a hot plasma in terms of the hard scale part of the process, where perturbative QCD should be applicable, and the soft scale part of the process, where we look to the AdS/CFT correspondence for guidance to possible strong effective coupling phenomena. In particular we estimate $\hat{q}$, the transport coefficient, supposing that at soft scales partons in the plasma all cascade to small-$x$-values as indicated by strong coupling SYM theory.Comment: 8 page

Deep Inelastic Scattering in Holographic AdS/QCD Models

We review the description of deep inelastic scattering using some AdS/QCD phenomenological models.Comment: Talk presented by NRFB at Light Cone 2009: Relativistic Hadronic and Particle Physics, 8-13 Jul 2009, Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazi

"A Theory of Commodity Tax Reform under Revenue Constraint"

Despite the development of the optimal taxation theory , few of the practicing tax economists question the traditional wisdom that making tax rates flat will lead to a more efficient tax system. Practicing tax economists seem to have an intuition that even if the uniform tax structure may not be the most efficient, it may be a close approximation. The present paper survey the literature that provides theoretical under-pinnings for the practitioner's intuition. Also, the paper simplifies the statements and proofs of theorems in literature.

Collinearly improved JIMWLK evolution in Langevin form

The high-energy evolution of Wilson line operators, which at leading order is described by the Balitsky-JIMWLK equations, receives large radiative corrections enhanced by single and double collinear logarithms at next-to-leading order and beyond. We propose a method for resumming such logarithmic corrections to all orders, at the level of the Langevin formulation of the JIMWLK equation. The ensuing, collinearly-improved Langevin equation features generalized Wilson line operators, which depend not only upon rapidity (the logarithm of the longitudinal momentum), but also upon the transverse size of the color neutral projectile to which the Wilson lines belong. This additional scale dependence is built up during the evolution, via the condition that the successive emissions of soft gluons be ordered in time. The presence of this transverse scale in the Langevin equation furthermore allows for the resummation of the one-loop running coupling corrections.Comment: 24 pages, 1 figur

Jet fragmentation and gauge/string duality

We consider an analog of e^+e^- annihilation in gauge theories which have a dual string description in asymptotically AdS_5 space and discuss the nature of jet fragmentation. We construct the timelike anomalous dimension which governs the scale dependence of the fragmentation function. In the limit of infinite 't Hooft coupling, the average multiplicity rises linearly with the energy and the inclusive spectrum is peaked at the kinematical boundary.Comment: 9 pages, v2:comments and references adde

Proton number fluctuation as a signal of the QCD critical end-point

We argue that the event-by-event fluctuation of the proton number is a meaningful and promising observable for the purpose of detecting the QCD critical end-point in heavy-ion collision experiments. The long range fluctuation of the order parameter induces a characteristic correlation between protons which can be measured. The proton fluctuation also manifests itself as anomalous enhancement of charge fluctuations near the end-point, which might be already seen in existing data.Comment: 4 pages, version accepted in PR