14338184
The Sphaleron Rate: Bodeker's Leading Log
Bodeker has recently shown that the high temperature sphaleron rate, which measures baryon number violation in the hot standard model, receives logarithmic corrections to its leading parametric behavior; Γ=κ′[log(mD/g2T)+O(1)](g2T2/mD2)αW5T4. After discussing the physical origin of these corrections, I compute the leading log coefficient numerically: κ′=10.8±0.7. The log is fairly small relative to the O(1) “correction;” so non-logarithmic contributions dominate at realistic values of the coupling.
119279378
Bjorken flow, plasma instabilities, and thermalization
A bstractAt asymptotically high energies, thermalization in heavy ion collisions can be described via weak-coupling QCD. We present a complete treatment of how thermalization proceeds, at the parametric weak-coupling level. We show that plasma instabilities dominate the dynamics, from immediately after the collision until well after the plasma becomes nearly in equilibrium. Initially they drive the system close to isotropy, but Bjorken expansion and increasing diluteness makes the system again become more anisotropic. At time $ \tau \sim {\alpha^{{\frac{{ - 12}}{5}}}}Q_s^{{ - 1}} $ the dynamics become dominated by a nearly-thermal bath; and at time $ \tau \sim {\alpha^{{\frac{{ - 5}}{2}}}}Q_s^{{ - 1}} $ the bath comes to dominate the energy density, completing thermalization. After this time there is a nearly isotropic and thermal Quark-Gluon Plasma.
118416779
Next-to-leading order thermal photon production in a weakly coupled quark-gluon plasma
A bstractWe compute the next-to-leading order O(g) correction to the thermal photon production rate in a QCD plasma. The NLO contributions can be expressed in terms of gauge invariant condensates on the light cone, which are amenable to novel sum rules and Euclidean techniques. We expect these technologies to be generalizable to other NLO calculations. For the phenomenologically interesting value of αs = 0.3, the NLO correction represents a 20% increase and has a functional form similar to the LO result.
10799212
Classical field dynamics of the electroweak phase transition
We investigate the thermodynamics and dynamics of the electroweak phase transition by modeling the infrared physics with classical Yang-Mills Higgs theory. We discuss the accuracy of this approach and conclude that, for quantities whose determination is dominated by the infrared, the classical method should be correct up to parametrically suppressed [i.e., O({alpha})] corrections. For a Higgs self-coupling which at the tree level corresponds to m{sub H}{approx_equal}50 GeV, we determine the jump in the order parameter to be {delta}{phi}=1.5gT, the surface tension to be {sigma}=0.07g{sup 4}T{sup 3}, and the friction coefficient on the moving bubble wall due to infrared bosons to be {eta}{equivalent_to}P/v{sub w}=0.03{plus_minus}0.004g{sup 6}T{sup 4}. We also investigate the response of the Chern-Simons number to a spatially uniform chemical potential and find that it falls off a short distance inside the bubble wall, both in equilibrium and below the equilibrium temperature. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}
119023526
The phantom menaced: Constraints on low-energy effective ghosts
It has been suggested that a scalar field with negative kinetic energy, or ``ghost,'' could be the source of the observed late-time cosmological acceleration. Naively, such theories should be ruled out by the catastrophic quantum instability of the vacuum. We derive phenomenological bounds on the Lorentz-violating ultraviolet cutoff $\ensuremath{\Lambda}$ which must apply to low-energy effective theories of ghosts, in order to keep the instability at unobservable levels. Assuming only that ghosts interact at least gravitationally, we show that $\ensuremath{\Lambda}\ensuremath{\lesssim}3\mathrm{MeV}$ for consistency with the cosmic gamma ray background. We also show that theories of ghosts with a Lorentz-conserving cutoff are completely excluded.
18843095
Classical sphaleron rate on fine lattices
We measure the sphaleron rate for hot, classical Yang-Mills theory on the lattice, in order to study its dependence on lattice spacing. By using a topological definition of Chern-Simons number and going to extremely fine lattices [up to $\ensuremath{\beta}=32,$ or lattice spacing ${a=1/(8g}^{2}T)]$ we demonstrate nontrivial scaling. The topological susceptibility, converted to physical units, falls with lattice spacing on fine lattices in a way which is consistent with linear dependence on a (the Arnold-Son-Yaffe scaling relation) and is difficult to reconcile with a nonzero continuum limit. We also explain some unusual behavior of the rate in small volumes, reported by Ambj\o{}rn and Krasnitz.
9605613
Integrating over the Coulomb branch in N = 2 gauge theory
Abstract We review the relation of certain integrals over the Coulomb phase of d = 4, N = 2 SO (3) supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory with Donaldson-Witten theory. We describe a new way to write an important contact term in the theory and show how the integrals generalize to higher rank gauge groups.
8410357
The Singular geometry of the sliver
We consider ``sliver'' states which act as projection operators in the matter star product of Witten's cubic string field theory. These sliver states, which might be associated with Dp-branes, are not finite norm states in the matter string Hilbert space. We describe the singularities of these states, and demonstrate that the sliver states are composed of strings having singular geometric features. These singularities take a particularly simple form in the zero slope limit α'→0, where the star algebra factorizes into a product of the algebra of functions on space-time and the non-commutative star product of fields associated with higher string modes. An analogy to the sliver geometry suggests a natural mechanism for describing closed string states in open string field theory.
122027749
The Ising Model, the Yang-Lee Edge Singularity, and 2D Quantum Gravity
Abstract We consider one-and two-matrix models recently used to define nonperturbative 2D quantum gravity. We prove the equivalence of the m = 3 multicritical one-matrix model and the Yang-Lee edge singularity coupled to 2D quantum gravity. We also derive formulae for the correlation functions for the Yang-Lee edge singularity and for the Ising model in their summed over topologies formulations.
123115671
Physical solutions for unitary matrix models
Abstract We study the simplest double scaling limit of the integral over a unitary matrix, shown by Periwal and Shevitz to admit an exact solution in terms of the mKdV hierarchy. We show that there is a unique non-perturbative solution of the string equation corresponding to the true double scaling limit of the integral, which interpolates smoothly between weak and strong coupling regimes.
14911027
Fractional Quantum Hall Effect and Nonabelian Statistics
It is argued that fractional quantum Hall effect wavefunctions can be interpreted as conformal blocks of two-dimensional conformal field theory. Fractional statistics can be extended to nonabelian statistics and examples can be constructed from conformal field theory. The Pfaffian state is related to the 2D Ising model and possesses fractionally charged excitations which are predicted to obey nonabelian statistics.