A Combined Solution of the Schwinger-Dyson and Bethe-Salpeter Equations for Mesons as $q\bar q$ Bound States

Abstract: The mass spectrum of heavy pseudoscalar mesons, described as quark-antiquark bound systems, is considered within the Bethe-Salpeter formalism with momentum dependent masses of the constituents. This dependence is found by solving the Schwinger-Dyson equation for quark propagators in rainbow-ladder approximation. Such an approximation is known to provide both a fast convergence of numerical methods and accurate results for lightest mesons. However, as the meson mass increases, the method becomes less stable and special attention must be devoted to details of numerical means of solving the corresponding equations. We focus on the pseudoscalar sector and show that our numerical scheme describes fairly accurately the $\pi$, $K$, $D$, $D_s$ and $\eta_c$ ground states. Excited states are considered as well. Our calculations are directly related to the future physics programme at FAIR.