Role of centre vortices in dynamical mass generation

The mass and renormalization functions of the nonperturbative quark propagator are studied in SU(3) gauge field theory with a Symanzik-improved gluon action and the AsqTad fermion action. Centre vortices in the gauge field are identified by fixing to maximal centre gauge. The role of centre vortices in dynamical mass generation is explored by removing centre vortices from the gauge fields and studying the associated changes in the quark propagator. We find that dynamical mass generation survives in the vortex-removed SU(3) gauge field theory despite the vanishing of the string tension and suppression of the gluon propagator in the infrared suggesting the possibility of decoupling dynamical mass generation from confinement.