Nonperturbative confinement in quantum chromodynamics: I. Study of an approximate equation of Mandelstam

An approximated form of the Dyson–Schwinger equation for the gluon propagator in quarkless QCD is subjected to nonlinear functional and numerical analysis. It is found that solutions exist, and that these have a double pole at the origin of the square of the propagator momentum, together with an accumulation of soft branch points. This analytic structure is strongly suggestive of confinement by infrared slavery