We investigate the Sakai-Sugimoto model at nonzero baryon chemical potential in a background magnetic field both in the confined phase and in the deconfined phase with restored chiral symmetry. In this case the 8-brane Chern-Simons term becomes important. In the confined phase it generates a gradient of the pseudoscalar “pion,” which carries a nonvanishing baryon charge. Above a critical value of the chemical potential there is a second-order phase transition to a mixed phase which includes also ordinary baryonic matter. However, at fixed baryon charge density the matter is purely pion-gradient above a critical magnetic field. In the deconfined chiral-symmetric phase at nonzero chemical potential the magnetic field induces an axial current. We also compute the magnetization of the baryonic matter and find that it is paramagnetic in all three phases but with nonlinear behavior at a large magnetic field.

• Received 24 September 2008

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.79.105024