Chiral symmetry restoration and deconfinement in QCD at finite temperature

The light-quark correlator in the axial-vector channel is used, in conjunction with finite energy QCD sum rules at finite temperature, in order to (a) establish a relation between chiral-symmetry restoration and deconfinement, and (b) determine the temperature behavior of the a(1)(1260) width and coupling. Results indicate that deconfinement takes place at a slightly lower temperature than chiral-symmetry restoration, although this difference is not significant given the accuracy of the method. The behavior of the a(1)(1260) parameters is consistent with quark-gluon deconfinement, as the width grows and the coupling decreases with increasing temperature.