Asymptotic freedom
In physics, asymptotic freedom is described by an effect of quantum chromodynamics: with increasing energy decreases the strength of the interaction or the coupling strength between the quarks. This effect can also be observed for small distances.
The opposite of asymptotic freedom, that is, the increase in the coupling strength, occurs at low energies or large distances and leads to the confinement of quarks in mesons and nucleons. Intuitively, this corresponds to the action of a rubber band or a spring.
The asymptotic freedom of quantum chromodynamics is based on the underlying non- Abelian SU (3 ) gauge symmetry.
For the discovery of asymptotic freedom in 1973, David Gross, David Politzer and Frank Wilczek won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2004.
Since the perturbation theory, the usual computational access to quantum field theories, only for small coupling strengths is valid, the results are of such calculations for the QCD only at high energies, ie, for asymptotically free quarks valid.
, The effect also occurs with other Yang-Mills theory, but also depends on the number of degrees of freedom flavor. In the case of SU (2) gauge theory, the effect already in 1969 by Josif Benzionowitsch Chriplowitsch ( Khriplovich ) was shown in the Soviet Union.