The Onset of Phase Transitions in Condensed Matter and Relativistic QFT

Abstract

Kibble and Zurek have provided a unifying causal picture for the appearance of topological defects like cosmic strings or vortices at the onset of phase transitions in relativistic QFT and condensed matter systems respectively. There is no direct experimental evidence in QFT, but in condensed matter the predictions are largely, but not wholly, supported in superfluid experiments on liquid helium. We provide an alternative picture for the initial appearance of strings/vortices that is commensurate with all the experimental evidence from condensed matter and consider some of its implications for QFT.

Is domain formation decided before or after the transition?

“…It is sufficient, for illustrative purposes, to restrict ourselves to the case of strong dissipation, whereby Airy functions become exponentials. As we have shown before [19], for strong damping,…”

Gaussianity revisited: exploring the Kibble–Zurek mechanism with superconducting rings

“…( 17) and the 2D equivalent (30), on substituting Eq. ( 21) for f (r), even though the annulus is not particularly wide [25]. As we would have anticipated, this difference is insensitive to self-coupling strength, as we have checked (but not displayed).…”

Optimized perturbation theory for charged scalar fields at finite temperature and in an external magnetic field

“…(2.9) are given by (2.12) and the dispersion relation for charged particles is given by Eq. (2.11), which takes into account the Landau energy levels of a charged particle in a magnetic field 2 .…”

“…Phase transition phenomena in spontaneously broken quantum field theories have long been a subject of importance and interest due to their wide range of possible applications, going from low energy phenomena in condensed matter systems to high energy phase transitions in particle physics and cosmology (for reviews, see for example [1][2][3]).…”