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The spin tensor is fundamental to relativistic spin hydrodynamics, but its definition is ambiguous due to the pseudogauge symmetry. We show that this ambiguity can be solved in interacting field theories. We prove that the mean field limit of the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model with spin-spin interactions is equivalent to non-dissipative spin hydrodynamics with a canonical spin tensor., Comment: 5 pages, comments welcome. v2: updated discussion

The vorticity is a quantity defined in a relativistic fluid that describes how much a fluid element is rotating and accelerating. By measuring the spin polarization of hadrons, it was found that the quark gluon plasma produced in heavy-ion collisions is the most "vorticous" fluid ever observed. More generally, this opens the possibility to study the physics of QCD matter using spin. Here I use statistical quantum field theory applied to a fluid in local thermodynamic equilibrium to show how to connect the average spin of a fermion with hydrodynamic quantities, and in particular with the thermal vorticity and the thermal shear. I show that the spin polarization of a Dirac particle induced by thermal vorticity is related to the gravitational (in medium) form factor related to spin-rotation coupling. For these reasons, as we are understanding the role of spin in hydrodynamics and in heavy-ion collisions, spin is becoming a promising tool to investigate the properties of QCD and whose applications are just begun to be explored., Comment: 9 pages, SPIN2023 conference proceedings

The spin polarization measurements of particles emitted in heavy-ion collisions have opened the possibility for new phenomenological investigations of spin physics in relativistic fluids. The theoretical predictions of global polarization are in agreement with the data, but consistent discrepancies stand out for the local polarization. We show that the covariant theory of relativistic quantum fluids at local equilibrium implies an additional, non-dissipative contribution to the spin polarization vector, which is proportional to the thermal shear, which has been previously overlooked. This additional contribution, together with an improved approximation in the expansion of the local equilibrium density operator, restores the quantitative agreement between the theoretical predictions and the experimental data., Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, presented at the XXIXth International Conference on Ultra-relativistic Nucleus-Nucleus Collisions (Quark Matter 2022). v2: Added ancillary files for the figures

The mean spin polarization vector of spin 1/2 particles in a relativistic fluid at local thermal equilibrium (LTE) in different pseudogauges (PGs), i.e., with different choices for the decomposition of orbital and spin angular momentum, is obtained. The spin polarization obtained in the canonical PG differs from the one obtained in the Belinfante PG. It is found that this difference can not be written by replacing the thermal vorticity with the spin potential in the usual polarization formula. Other PG choices affect the contribution of thermal shear to the spin polarization. Therefore, the choice of a PG affects the predictions for the polarization measured in heavy-ion collisions. In general, it is shown that the Wigner function of a noninteracting Dirac field at LTE is affected by the PG transformations. Explicit expressions of the mean axial current are also calculated and it is found that even the axial vortical effect conductivity depends on the PG., Comment: 14 pages, Final proofread version published in PRC

We show that the inclusion of a recently found additional term of the spin polarization vector at local equilibrium which is linear in the symmetrized gradients of the velocity field, and the assumption of hadron production at constant temperature restore the quantitative agreement between hydrodynamic model predictions and local polarization measurements in relativistic heavy ion collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 200$ GeV. The longitudinal component of the spin polarization vector turns out to be very sensitive to the temperature value, with a good fit around 155 MeV. The implications of this finding are discussed., Comment: 6 pages, 6 figures. Version accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.Lett

We show that spin polarization of a fermion in a relativistic fluid at local thermodynamic equilibrium can be generated by the symmetric derivative of the four-temperature vector, defined as thermal shear. As a consequence, besides vorticity, acceleration and temperature gradient, also the shear tensor contributes to the polarization of particles in a fluid. This contribution to the spin polarization vector, which is entirely non-dissipative, adds to the well known term proportional to thermal vorticity and may thus have important consequences for the solution of the local polarization puzzles observed in relativistic heavy ion collisions., Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure; version accepted for publication in Physics Letters B

We study the function series $\sum_{n=1}^\infty \phi^{2m+2} \text{cosch}^{2m+2}(n\phi/2)$, and similar series, for integers $m$ and complex $\phi$. This hyperbolic series is linearly related to the Lambert series. The Lambert series is known to satisfy a functional equation which defines the Ramanujan polynomials. By using residue theorem (summation theorem) we find the functional equation satisfied by this hyperbolic series. The functional equation identifies a class of polynomials which can be seen as a generalization of the Ramanujan polynomials. These polynomials coincide with the asymptotic expansion of the hyperbolic series at the origin and they all vanish for $\phi=\pm 2\pi i$. We furthermore derive several identities between Harmonic numbers and ordinary and generalized Bernoulli polynomials., Comment: 34 pages, 3 figures

The coupling between the spin of a massive Dirac fermion and the angular momentum of the medium, i.e. the gravitomagnetic moment, is shown here to be renormalized by QED interactions at finite temperature. This means that the anomalous gravitomagnetic moment (AGM) does not vanish, and implies that thermal effects can break the Einstein equivalence principle in quantum field theory, as argued previously. We also show that the AGM causes radiative corrections to the axial current of massive fermions induced by vorticity in quantum relativistic fluids, similarly to the previous findings for massless fermions. The radiative QCD effects on the AGM should significantly affect the production of polarized hadrons in heavy-ion collisions., Comment: 37 pages, 2 figures; final version published in Phys Rev D

We present a study of the thermodynamics of the massless free Dirac field at equilibrium with axial charge, angular momentum and and external electromagnetic field to assess the interplay between chirality, vorticity and electromagnetic field in relativistic fluids. After discussing the general features of global thermodynamic equilibrium in quantum relativistic statistical mechanics, we calculate the thermal expectation values. Axial imbalance and electromagnetic field are included non-perturbatively by using the exact solutions of the Dirac equation, while a perturbative expansion is carried out in thermal vorticity. It is shown that the chiral vortical effect and the axial vortical effect are not affected by a constant homogeneous electromagnetic field., Comment: 40 pages; final version published in "Strongly Interacting Matter under Rotation", Lect. Notes Phys. 987

We show that local parity violation due to chirality imbalance in relativistic nuclear collisions can be revealed by measuring the projection of the polarization vector onto the momentum, i.e. the helicity, of final state baryons. The proposed method does not require a coupling to the electromagnetic field, like in the Chiral Magnetic Effect. By using linear response theory, we show that, in the presence of a chiral imbalance, the spin 1/2 baryons and anti-baryons receive an additional contribution to the polarization along their momentum and proportional to the axial chemical potential. The additional, parity-breaking, contribution to helicity can be detected by studying helicity-helicity azimuthal angular correlation., Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures; final version to appear in Physics Letters B

We derive a general exact form of the phase space distribution function and the thermal expectation values of local operators for the free quantum scalar field at equilibrium with rotation and acceleration in flat space-time without solving field equations in curvilinear coordinates. After factorizing the density operator with group theoretical methods, we obtain the exact form of the phase space distribution function as a formal series in thermal vorticity through an iterative method and we calculate thermal expectation values by means of analytic continuation techniques. We separately discuss the cases of pure rotation and pure acceleration and derive analytic results for the stress-energy tensor of the massless field. The expressions found agree with the exact analytic solutions obtained by solving the field equation in suitable curvilinear coordinates for the two cases at stake and already - or implicitly - known in literature. In order to extract finite values for the pure acceleration case we introduce the concept of analytic distillation of a complex function. For the massless field, the obtained expressions of the currents are polynomials in the acceleration/temperature ratios which vanish at $2\pi$, in full accordance with the Unruh effect., Comment: 38 pages, 1 figure. Final proofread version published in JHEP

In this work the non-equilibrium density operator approach introduced by Zubarev more than 50 years ago to describe quantum systems at local thermodynamic equilibrium is revisited. This method - which was used to obtain the first ''Kubo" formula of shear viscosity, is especially suitable to describe quantum effects in fluids. This feature makes it a viable tool to describe the physics of the Quark Gluon Plasma in relativistic nuclear collisions., Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure. Submitted to special issue of Particles: "Nonequilibrium Phenomena in Strongly Correlated System"

We calculate the constitutive equations of the stress-energy tensor and the currents of the free massless Dirac field at thermodynamic equilibrium with acceleration and rotation and a conserved axial charge by using the density operator approach. We carry out an expansion in thermal vorticity to the second order with finite axial chemical potential $\mu_A$. The obtained coefficients of the expansion are expressed as correlators of angular momenta and boost operators with the currents. We confirm previous observations that the axial chemical potential induces non-vanishing components of the stress-energy tensor at first order in thermal vorticity due to breaking of parity invariance of the density operator with $\mu_A \ne 0$. The appearance of these components might play an important role in chiral hydrodynamics., Comment: 29 pages, final version published in JHEP, typos

We present a systematic calculation of the corrections of the stress-energy tensor and currents of the free boson and Dirac fields up to second order in thermal vorticity, which is relevant for relativistic hydrodynamics. These corrections are non-dissipative because they survive at general thermodynamic equilibrium with non vanishing mean values of the conserved generators of the Lorentz group, i.e. angular momenta and boosts. Their equilibrium nature makes it possible to express the relevant coefficients by means of correlators of the angular-momentum and boost operators with stress-energy tensor and current, thus making simpler to determine their so-called "Kubo formulae". We show that, at least for free fields, the corrections are of quantum origin and we study several limiting cases and compare our results with previous calculations. We find that the axial current of the free Dirac field receives corrections proportional to the vorticity independently of the anomalous term., Comment: 33 pages, final version published in JHEP, typos