Heavy and heavy-light mesons and the Lorentz structure of the quark-antiquark interaction

Abstract: We solve a Minkowski-space integral equation, derived in the Covariant Spectator Theory, for quark-antiquark bound states describing heavy and heavy-light mesons. The equation's kernel contains a one-gluon exchange interaction and a covariant generalization of a linear confining potential with a mixed scalar, pseudoscalar, and vector Lorentz structure, characterized by a continuous mixing parameter. We investigate to what extent the Lorentz structure of the confining kernel can be determined by fitting the mixing parameter to the meson spectrum.