Finite size scaling and low mass glueballs

We propose finite lattice effects as a probe of the glueball mass spectrum, and give an analysis of the recent SU(2) Monte Carlo data of Brower, Nauenberg and Schalk in terms of a gas of free glueballs. For L⁴ lattices with L = 4, 5, 6 fits are made to ξ(m = 1/aξ) which indicate a rather large effective number of degrees of freedom (i.e. statistical degeneracy where a spin J counts as 2J + 1) from 5 to 15 states. As the degeneracy is increased, the central glueball mass increases from $\text{m = (1.3±0.2)}\text{κ}$ at degeneracy 5 to about $\text{m = (1.9±0.2)}\text{κ}$ at degeneracy 15, relative to the SU(2) string tension $\text{κ}$.