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Effective field theory for thermal QCD with 2+1 flavors

Sourendu Gupta*

Pritam Sen†

Rishi Sharma‡

  • *Contact author: sgupta@theory.tifr.res.in
  • †Contact author: spsps3333@iacs.res.in
  • ‡Contact author: rishi@theory.tifr.res.in
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Phys. Rev. D 114, 014041 – Published 20 July, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/q332-kkvc

Abstract

We write a long-distance effective field theory (EFT) for QCD at finite temperature just below the crossover temperature Tco. The low energy constants of this EFT are obtained from lattice measurements of the screening mass of pions at two temperatures for Nf=2+1 using lattice results obtained at physical values of pion and Kaon masses, and Nf=2 where the lattice simulations were performed with a heavier pion mass. The EFT gives good predictions for other static pion properties for Nf=2, where lattice results are available. We show the corresponding predictions for Nf=2+1, where they are not yet measured. We demonstrate that EFT gives excellent predictions for the phase diagram in Nf=2+1. The predictions for the pressure are investigated, and predictions are also given for a Wick-rotated real-time quantity called the kinetic mass.

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Phys. Rev. D 114, 014041– Published 20 July, 2026
  • Received 12 November 2025
  • Accepted 4 June 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

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