The structure of the Yang-Mills spectrum for arbitrary simple gauge algebras

The mass spectrum of pure Yang-Mills theory in 3 + 1 dimensions is discussed for an arbitrary simple gauge algebra within a quasigluon picture. The general structure of the low-lying gluelump and two-quasigluon glueball spectrum is shown to be common to all algebras, while the lightest C = - three-quasigluon glueballs only exist when the gauge algebra is A(r >= 2), that is, in particular, su(N >= 3). Higher-lying C = - glueballs are shown to exist only for the A(r >= 2), Dodd-r >= 4 and E-6 gauge algebras. The shape of the static energy between adjoint sources is also discussed assuming the Casimir scaling hypothesis and a funnel form; it appears to be gauge-algebra dependent when at least three sources are considered. As a main result, the present framework's predictions are shown to be consistent with available lattice data in the particular case of an su(N) gauge algebra within 't Hooft's large-N limit.