119555468
Next-to-Leading Order Shear Viscosity in lambda phi**4 Theory
We show that the shear viscosity of $\ensuremath{\lambda}{\ensuremath{\phi}}^{4}$ theory is sensitive at next-to-leading order to soft physics, which gives rise to subleading corrections suppressed by only a half power of the coupling, $\ensuremath{\eta}=\phantom{\rule{0ex}{0ex}}\frac{(3033.54+1548.3\sqrt{(N+2)\ensuremath{\lambda}/72})N{T}^{3}}{\frac{N+2}{3}{\ensuremath{\lambda}}^{2}}$. The series appears to converge about as well as the series for the pressure.
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.
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}
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.
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.
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.
121599429
Semi-off-shell string amplitudes
We study n-string amplitudes with one or two strings off-shell using the Polyakov path integral. The residues of the poles of these amplitudes correspond to the correct S-matrix elements. The coupling of gravitons to off-shell amplitudes shows that objects invariant under all world-sheet symmetries are also invariant under spacetime gauge symmetries. We interpret our results in terms of a local operator expansion.
124306496
The M theory three form and E(8) gauge theory
15941006
Noncommutative Solitons on Orbifolds
In the noncommutative field theory of open strings in a B-field, D-branes arise as solitons described as projection operators or partial isometries in a $C^*$ algebra. We discuss how D-branes on orbifolds fit naturally into this algebraic framework, through the examples of $R^n/G$, $T^n=R^n/Z^n$, and $T^n/G$. We also propose a framework for formulating D-branes on asymmetric orbifolds.
120400824
Rationality in conformal field theory
We show that if the one-loop partition function of a modular invariant conformal field theory can be expressed as a finite sum of holomorphically factorized terms thenc and all values ofh are rational.
120541805
Atkin-Lehner symmetry
Abstract The vanishing of the one-loop string cosmological constant in nontrivial non supersymmetric backgrounds can be understood by viewing the path integral as an inner product of orthogonal wave functions. For special backgrounds the string theory has an extra symmetry, expressed as a transformation on moduli space. When left- and right-moving wave functions transform in different representations of this symmetry the cosmological constant must vanish. Specific examples of the mechanism are given at one loop for theories in two and four dimensions. Various suggestions are made for the higher loop extension of this idea.