Effects of mesonic correlations in the QCD phase transition

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The finite temperature phase transition of strongly interacting matter is studied within a nonlocal chiral quark model of the NJL type coupled to a Polyakov loop. In contrast to previous investigations which were restricted to the mean-field approximation, mesonic correlations are included by evaluating the quark-antiquark ring sum. For physical pion masses, we find that the pions dominate the pressure below the phase transition, whereas above Tc the pressure is well described by the mean-field approximation result. For large pion masses, as realized in lattice simulations, the meson effects are suppressed.