Topologically induced local P and CP violation in QCD x QED

The existence of topological solutions and axial anomaly open a possibility of P and CP violation in QCD. For a reason that has not yet been established conclusively, this possibility is not realized in strong interactions - the experimental data indicate that a global P and CP violation in QCD is absent. Nevertheless, the fluctuations of topological charge in QCD vacuum, although not observable directly, are expected to play an important role in the breaking of U-A(1) symmetry and in the mass spectrum and other properties of hadrons. Moreover, in the presence of very intense external electromagnetic fields topological solutions of QCD can induce local P- and CP-odd effects in the SUc(3) x U-em(1) gauge theory that can be observed in experiment directly. Here I show how these local parity-violating phenomena can be described by using the Maxwell-Chern-Simons, or axion, electrodynamics as an effective theory. Local P- and CP-violation in hot QCD matter can be observed in experiment through the chiral magnetic effect - the separation of electric charge along the axis of magnetic field. Very recently, STAR Collaboration presented an observation of the electric charge asymmetry with respect to reaction plane in relativistic heavy ion collisions at RHIC. (C) 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.