LATTICE QCD WITH MANY FLAVORS

We discuss the confining and chiral-symmetry breaking properties of QC D with a large number of flavors N-f. In a Monte Carlo simulation of Q CD with N-f = 16 staggered fermions, we find clear evidence of a first order bulk phase transition which separates phases with broken and un broken chiral symmetry. This is consistent with extrapolations of earl ier studies with smaller N-f, and is also as expected from general arg uments. Thus, even when the perturbative renormalization group flow ha s a new infrared stable fixed point near the origin, lattice artifacts induce chiral symmetry breaking, and presumably confinement, at suffi ciently strong coupling. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.