We study SU(3) gauge theory on small lattices in the minimal (qutrit) electric field truncation retaining only the ${\bf 1}, {\bf 3}, {\bf \overline{3}}$ representations for the link variables. Explicit expressions are given for the Kogut-Susskind Hamiltonian for the square plaquette chain and the two-dimensional honeycomb lattice. Our formalism can be easily extended to the minimally truncated general SU($N_c$) gauge theory. The addition of (static) quarks is discussed. We present results for the energy spectrum of the gauge field on these lattices by exact diagonalization of the Hamiltonian and analyze its statistical properties. We also compute the SU(3) string tension and discuss how it is modified by vacuum fluctuations. Finally, we calculate the potential energies of a static quark-antiquark pair and three static quarks and study their screening at finite temperature.

We will calculate the diquark mass together with the quark-diquark potential. We apply an extended HAL QCD potential method to a baryonic system made up from a static quark and a diquark. Numerical calculations are performed by employing 2+1 flavor QCD gaugeconfigurations generated by CP-PACS and JLQCD Collaborations on a $16^{3} \times 32$ lattice with $a^{-1} \approx 1.6$ GeV. To improve the statistical noise in the propagators of the static quark, the HYP smearing is employed on the gauge links. Two-point correlators of quark-diquark baryonic system are then computed to obtain their ground-state energies where various types of diquarks are considered (eg: scalar diquark, axial-vector diquark etc). We apply an extended HAL QCD method on a baryonic system made up from a scalar diquark and a static quark to study the scalar diquark mass and the quark-diquark potential. In order to determine the diquark mass self-consistently in this HALQCD method, we demand that the baryonic spectrum in the p-wave sector obtained from the two-point correlators should be reproduced by the potential obtained from the baryonic system in the s-wave sector. We obtain the scalar diquark mass of roughly $(2/3) m_{N}$ , i.e., twice the naïve estimates of a constituent quark mass together with the quark-diquark potential of Cornell type (Coulomb + linear).

Motivated by axion-like inflation and its warm embedding within the Standard Model, we study the early stages of the energy transfer between an axion condensate and an SU(2) gauge ensemble, by employing non-linear classical real-time lattice simulations. The discretized equations of motion are worked out, elaborating on Gauss constraints. A numerical solution is implemented on the CosmoLattice platform. Adopting a quadratic potential, and omitting universe expansion for the moment, we establish initial exponential growth of the low-momentum gauge modes; damping of axion oscillations after some delay; and subsequent energy equipartition between axion and gauge ensembles. A clear difference between the SU(2) and U(1) dynamics is observed, likely associated with non-Abelian self-interactions. We elaborate on what this implies for the possible thermalization of the SU(2) ensemble.

Machine-learning (ML) models trained on Ising spin configurations have demonstrated surprising effectiveness in classifying phases of Potts models, even when processing severely reduced representations that retain only two spin states. To unravel this remarkable capability, we identify a family of alternative order parameters for the $q=3$ and $q=4$ Potts models on a square lattice, constructed from the occupancies of secondary and minimal spin states rather than the conventional dominant-state order parameter. Through systematic finite-size scaling analyses, we demonstrate that these quantities, along with a magnetization-like quantity derived from a reduced spin representation, accurately capture critical behavior, yielding critical temperatures and exponents consistent with established theoretical predictions and numerical benchmarks. Furthermore, we rigorously establish the fundamental relationships between these alternative (quasi)order parameters, demonstrating how they collectively encode criticality through different aspects of spin configurations. Our results clarify, within this specific setting, how reduced spin representations can retain the essential thermodynamic information needed for identifying critical behavior. Taken together, this work establishes a concrete bridge between Ising-trained ML models and critical phenomena in Potts systems by showing that Potts criticality can be encoded in more compact, non-traditional forms, thereby opening avenues for discovering analogous order parameters in broader spin systems.

In many extensions of the Standard Model electroweak phase transitions at high temperatures can be described in a minimal dimensionally reduced effective theory with SU(2) gauge field and fundamental Higgs scalar. In this effective theory, all thermodynamic information is governed by two dimensionless ratios $x \equiv \lambda_3/g^2_3$ and $y\equiv m^2_3/g^4_3$, where $\lambda_3$, $m^2_3$ and $g_3$ are the effective thermal scalar self-interaction coupling, the thermal mass and the effective gauge-coupling, respectively. By using non-perturbative lattice simulations to determine the rate of sphaleron transitions in the entire $(x,y)$-plane corresponding to the Higgs phase, and by applying previous lattice results for the bubble nucleation, we find a condition $x(T_c) \lesssim 0.025$ to guarantee preservation of the baryon asymmetry, which translates to $v/T_c \equiv \sqrt{2 \Delta \langle \phi^\dagger \phi \rangle}/T_c \gtrsim 1.33$ for the (gauge-invariant) discontinuity in Higgs condensate. This indicates that viability of the electroweak baryogenesis requires the phase transition to be slightly stronger than previously anticipated. Finally, we present a general template for analysing such viability in a wide class of beyond the Standard Model theories, in which new fields are heavy enough to be integrated out at high temperature.

We study a time-reversal invariant vortex, namely a spin vortex, in helical superconductors by focusing on its emergent gravitational structure. The topology of the time-reversal invariant vortex is classified by a $\mathbb{Z}_2$ invariant: helical Majorana zero modes appear at the vortex core when the winding number is odd, while no such zero modes exist when it is even. We provide a formal mapping to the theory of gravity to describe this $\mathbb{Z}_2$ topological structure. Identifying a superconducting order parameter as a vielbein in the theory of gravity, we explicitly convert the Bogoliubov-de-Genne Hamiltonian into the Dirac Hamiltonian coupled to a nontrivial gravitational field. Then we find that a gravitational curvature is induced at the vortex core, with its total flux quantized in integer multiples of $\pi$, reflecting the $\mathbb{Z}_2$ topology. Although the curvature vanishes everywhere except at the vortex core, the energy spectrum remains sensitive to the total curvature flux, owing to the gravitational Aharonov-Bohm effect. We further demonstrate that our gravitational framework can be applied to the topological phase transition driven by the vortex-linking precess in three-dimensional helical superconductors such as the He-B phase.