Deconfinement and chiral symmetry restoration in an SU(3) gauge theory with adjoint fermions Original Research Article

We analyze the finite temperature phase diagram of QCD with fermions in the adjoint representation. The simulations performed with four dynamical Majorana fermions show that the deconfinement and chiral phase transitions occur at two distinct temperatures. While the deconfinement transition is first-order at Td we find evidence for a continuous chiral transition at a higher temperature Tc ⋍ 8 Td. We observe a rapid change of bulk thermodynamic observables at Td which reflects the increase in the number of degrees of freedom. However, these show little variation at Tc, where the fermion condensate vanishes. We also analyze the potential between static fundamental and adjoint charges in all three phases and extract the corresponding screening masses above Td.