Effective low-energy theories and QCD Dirac spectra

We analyze the smallest Dirac eigenvalues by formulating an effective theory for the Dirac spectrum. We find that in a domain where the kinetic term of the effective theory can be ignored, the Dirac eigenvalues are distributed according to a Random Matrix Theory with the global symmetries of the QCD partition function. The kinetic term provides information on the slope of the average spectral density of the Dirac operator. In the second half of this lecture we interpret quenched QCD Dirac spectra (with eigenvalues scattered in the complex plane) in terms of an effective low energy theory.