The Analytic Structure of the QCD Propagators, Confinement, and Deconfinement

We present the first complete calculation of the analytic structure of the zero-spatial-momentum finite-temperature Landau-gauge gluon propagator carried out at one loop by a massive deformation of QCD perturbation theory — the screened massive expansion — at temperatures ranging from \(T=0\) to \(T≈ 3Tc\). We find no signatures of deconfinement in the form of meaningful changes in said structure. We argue that, beyond Euclidean space, massive perturbative methods — including the Curci–Ferrari model — might be missing crucial dynamical information as a consequence of the perturbative violation of QCD’s Ward identities. Abstract Published by the Jagiellonian University 2026 authors