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The present work reviews the various aspects of the extension of the large-$N_c$ approach, as had been proposed and developed by 't Hooft, to the case of tetraquark states, which are a category of the general class of exotic states, also called multiquark states, whose internal valence-quark structure does not match with that of ordinary hadrons, and which have received, in recent years, many experimental confirmations. The primary question of describing, or probing, on theoretical grounds, multiquark states is first examined. The signature of such states inside Feynman diagrams in relation with their singularities is highlighted. The main mechanisms of formation of tetraquark states, provided by the diquark model and the molecular scheme, are considered together with their specific implications. The properties of tetraquark states at large $N_c$ are analyzed through the Feynman diagrams that describe two-meson scattering amplitudes. It turns out that, in that limit, the possible formation of tetraquark states is mainly due to the mutual interactions of their internal mesonic clusters. These essentially arise from the quark-rearrangement, or quark-interchange, mechanism. In coupled-channel meson-meson scattering amplitudes, one may expect the occurrence of two independent tetraquark states, each having priviledged couplings with the two mesons of their dominant channel. The question of the energy balance of various schemes in the static limit is also analyzed. The clarification of the mechanisms that are at work in the formation of tetraquarks is the main outcome from the large-$N_c$ approach to this problem., Comment: 132 pages, 53 figures. Review article. v2: Sections 2.7 and 5.4 have been slightly extended; a few clarifying comments have been added in other sections; figure 43 has been completed; references have been added

International audience; Considering quantum chromodynamics in the consistent limit of simultaneous correlated increase of the number of colours, $N_c$, beyond bounds and decrease of the strong coupling to zero allows for solid statements about qualitative features of the class of “truly exotic” tetraquark mesons carrying four mutually distinct quark flavours. Consistency criteria extracted from correlation functions for two-ordinary-meson scattering suggest the existence of more than one such tetraquarks, at least, of two tetraquarks of identical quark-flavour content and large-$N_c$ behaviour of the total decay widths but differing in, and hence discriminable by, their predominant decay modes into two conventional mesons. This pairwise appearance is in conflict with the unique variant of such a four-quark bound state arising from the binding of diquark and antidiquark to a tetraquark by the strong interactions.

We discuss the Operator Product Expansion (OPE) and quark-hadron duality for two-point Green functions of tetraquark currents. We emphasize that the factorizable part of the OPE series for such Green functions, including nonperturbative contributions described by QCD condensates, is saturated by the full system of ordinary hadrons and therefore cannot have any relationship to the possible tetraquark bound states. Possible tetraquark bound states may be contained in nonfactorizable parts of these Green functions. In the framework of the $1/N_c$ expansion in QCD$(N_c)$, nonfactorizable parts of the two-point Green functions of tetraquark currents provide $N_c$-suppressed contributions compared to the $N_c$-leading factorizable parts. A possible exotic tetraquark state may appear only in $N_c$-subleading contributions to the QCD Green functions, in full accord with the well-known rigorous properties of large-$N_c$ QCD., Comment: 11 pages

Flavour-exotic tetraquark mesons, by definition bound states of two quarks and two antiquarks of four mutually different quark flavours, are, for given Lorentz features, subject to two incompatible constraints: On the one hand, within quantum chromodynamics a formation of compact tetraquark states is most easily envisaged by merging two colour-antisymmetric two-quark clusters, a diquark and an antidiquark. This path, however, leads to merely a single tetraquark state of chosen Lorentz characteristics. On the other hand, in the limit of the number of colour degrees of freedom growing beyond bounds, internal consistency at leading order calls for the presence of (at least) two of such tetraquark states of identical quark-flavour composition. The failure of attempts to reconcile these two contradictory insights suggests the nonexistence of compact flavour-exotic tetraquark mesons., 7 pages, 4 figures, talk presented at the "European Physical Society Conference on High Energy Physics - EPS-HEP 2019" (10 - 17 July 2019, Ghent, Belgium)

International audience; Flavour-exotic tetraquark mesons, by definition bound states of two quarks and two antiquarks of four mutually different quark flavours, are, for given Lorentz features, subject to two incompatible constraints: On the one hand, within quantum chromodynamics a formation of compact tetraquark states is most easily envisaged by merging two colour-antisymmetric two-quark clusters, a diquark and an antidiquark. This path, however, leads to merely a single tetraquark state of chosen Lorentz characteristics. On the other hand, in the limit of the number of colour degrees of freedom growing beyond bounds, internal consistency at leading order calls for the presence of (at least) two of such tetraquark states of identical quark-flavour composition. The failure of attempts to reconcile these two contradictory insights suggests the nonexistence of compact flavour-exotic tetraquark mesons.

A salient feature shared by all tetraquark candidates observed in experiment is the absence of flavor-exotic states of the type $\bar a b\bar c d$, with four different quark flavors. This phenomenon may be understood from the properties of large-$N_c$ QCD: On the one hand, consistency conditions for flavor-exotic Green functions, potentially containing these tetraquark poles, require the existence of two tetraquarks $T_A$ and $T_B$: each of them should decay dominantly via a single two-meson channel, $T_A\to M_{\bar a b}M_{\bar c d}$ and $T_B\to M_{\bar a d}M_{\bar c b}$, with suppressed rates $T_A\to M_{\bar a d}M_{\bar c b}$ and $T_B\to M_{\bar a b}M_{\bar c d}$. On the other hand, we have at hand only one diquark-antidiquark flavor structure $(\bar a \bar c)(b d)$ that might produce a compact tetraquark bound state. Taking into account that the diquark-antidiquark structure is the only viable candidate for a compact tetraquark state, one concludes that it is impossible to have two different narrow tetraquarks decaying dominantly into different two-meson channels. This contradiction suggests that large-$N_c$ QCD does not support the existence of narrow flavor-exotic tetraquarks. This argument does not rule out the possible existence of broad molecular-type flavor-exotic states, or of molecular-type bound states lying very close to the two-meson thresholds., 8 pages

International audience; We analyse exotic tetraquark mesons — bound states formed by two quarks and two antiquarks — for the specific case of four different quark flavours within the framework of a well-defined limit of quantum chromodynamics characterized by the correlated growth without bound of the number of colour degrees of freedom and approach to zero of the coupling constant of the strong interactions. On the one hand, the assumption that the tetraquarks of the kind defined above show up, as poles in the amplitudes for the scattering of two ordinary mesons with flavour quantum numbers that match those of these tetraquarks, already at lowest possible order in an expansion in inverse powers of the number of colours implies the existence of two types of flavour-exotic tetraquarks, distinguishable by their dominant transitions to two ordinary mesons. On the other hand, we are aware of merely a single, unique colour-singlet arrangement of two quarks and two antiquarks capable of tolerating a compact flavour-exotic tetraquark, a bound state of colour-antisymmetric diquark and antidiquark. In view of these two clearly contradictory observations, we are led to the plausible conclusion that, within the considered limiting case of quantum chromodynamics, a conceivable explanation of the riddle might consist in the non-existence of any flavour-exotic tetraquarks in formof narrowstates.

Two-ordinary-meson scattering in large-$N_c$ QCD implies consistency criteria for intermediate-tetraquark contributions. Their fulfilment at $N_c$-leading order constrains the nature of the spectrum of genuinely exotic tetraquark states., Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, contributed to "QCD@Work 2018 - International Workshop on Quantum Chromodynamics: Theory and Experiment" (25 - 28 June 2018, Matera, Italy)

We embark on systematic explorations of the behaviour of tetraquark mesons (colour-singlet bound states of two quarks and two antiquarks) in the (idealized) limit of a large number $N_c$ of colour degrees of freedom of quantum chromodynamics. Considering the scattering of two ordinary mesons into two ordinary mesons, we start off with formulating a set of selection criteria that should enable us to unambiguously single out precisely those contributions to all encountered scattering amplitudes that potentially will develop tetraquark poles. Assuming that tetraquark mesons do exist and, if so, emerge in the contributions compatible with our criteria at largest admissible order of $N_c$, we deduce, for the categories of tetraquarks that exhibit either four or only two different open quark flavours, that the decay rates of these tetraquark types are, at least, of order $1/N_c^2$ and that internal consistency requires all the members of the first species to exist pairwise, distinguishable by their favoured two-ordinary-meson decay channels., 8 pages, 5 figures, talk presented at "QUARKS-2018 - XXth International Seminar on High Energy Physics" (27 May - 2 June 2018, Valday, Russia)

Following Golterman and Shamir, we develop scale-chiral perturbation theory in the large $N_c$ and large $N_f$ Veneziano limit that incorporates both light-quark baryons and hidden local symmetric bosons and derive a leading-order scale symmetry Lagrangian applicable in nuclear physics. Some applications in the medium-free space and baryonic matter are discussed., 8 pages

Scrutinizing the scattering of ordinary mesons in the limiting case of the number of colour degrees of freedom $N_{\rm c}$ of quantum chromodynamics approaching infinity, we formulate Feynman-diagram selection criteria and from these deduce rigorous self-consistency conditions for the manifestation of a tetraquark, a two-quark-two-antiquark bound state, as a pole in the corresponding amplitudes. Our constraints bear rather far-reaching consequences: In particular, all flavour-exotic tetraquarks, composed of four (anti)quarks of disparate flavour, must come in, at least, two variants differing in (and thus readily identifiable by) the large-$N_{\rm c}$ behaviour of their couplings to two ordinary mesons. Quite generally, irrespective of their flavour composition, all tetraquarks prove to be narrow. Their decay rates behave, for large $N_{\rm c},$ like $1/N_{\rm c}^2$ and thus decrease faster than those of ordinary mesons., Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, contributed to "XVII International Conference on Hadron Spectroscopy and Structure - Hadron2017" (25 - 29 September 2017, Salamanca, Spain)

Discussing four-point Green functions of bilinear quark currents in large-$N_c$ QCD, we formulate rigorous criteria for selecting diagrams appropriate for the analysis of potential tetraquark poles. We find that both flavor-exotic and cryptoexotic (i.e., flavor-nonexotic) tetraquarks, if such poles exist, have a width of order $O(1/N_c^2)$, so they are parametrically narrower compared to the ordinary $\bar qq$ mesons, which have a width of order $O(1/N_c)$. Moreover, for flavor-exotic states, the consistency of the large-$N_c$ behavior of "direct" and "recombination" Green functions requires two narrow flavor-exotic states, each coupling dominantly to one specific meson-meson channel., 5 pages, version to appear in PRD, minor text modifications, conclusions remain unchanged

Considering four-point correlation functions of color-singlet quark bilinears, we investigate, in the large-$N_{\mathrm{c}}$ limit of QCD, the subleading diagrams that involve, in the $s$-channel of meson-meson scattering amplitudes, two-quark--two-antiquark intermediate states. The latter contribute, together with gluon exchanges, to the formation, at the hadronic level, of two-meson and tetraquark intermediate states. It is shown that the two-meson contributions, which are predictable, in general, from leading-order $N_{\mathrm{c}}$-behaviors, consistently satisfy the constraints resulting from the $1/N_{\mathrm{c}}$ expansion procedure and thus provide a firm basis for the extraction of tetraquark properties from $N_{\mathrm{c}}$-subleading diagrams. We find that, in general, tetraquarks, if they exist in compact form, should have narrow decay widths, of the order of $N_{\mathrm{c}}^{-2}$. For the particular case of exotic tetraquarks, involving four different quark flavors, two different types of tetraquark are needed, each having a preferred decay channel, to satisfy the consistency constraints., 23 pages, 24 figures. A few clarifying paragraphs, two figures and one reference have been added