Phase transitions out of equilibrium: Domain formation and growth

Journal Article · Thu Jul 15 00:00:00 EDT 1993 · Physical Review, D (Particles Fields); (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.48.800· OSTI ID:6518230

Boyanovsky, D; Lee, D ^[1]; Singh, A ^[2]

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1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260 (United States)
2. Department of Physics, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213 (United States)

We study the dynamics of phase transitions out of equilibrium in weakly coupled scalar field theories. We consider the case in which there is a rapid supercooling from an initial symmetric phase in thermal equilibrium at temperature [ital T][sub [ital i]][gt][ital T][sub [ital c]] to a final state at low temperature [ital T][sub [ital f]][approx]0. In particular we study the formation and growth of correlated domains out of equilibrium. It is shown that the dynamics of the process of domain formation and growth (spinodal decomposition) cannot be studied in perturbation theory, and a nonperturbative self-consistent Hartree approximation is used to study the long time evolution. We find in weakly coupled theories that the size of domains grows at long times as [xi][sub [ital D]]([ital t])[approx] [radical][ital t][xi](0). The size of the domains and the amplitude of the fluctuations grow up to a maximum time [ital t][sub [ital s]] which in weakly coupled theories is estimated to be [ital t][sub [ital s]][approx][minus][xi](0)ln [(3[lambda]/4[pi][sup 3])[sup 1/2] ( ( [ital T][sub [ital i]] / 2[ital T][sub [ital c]] )[sup 3] / [[ital T][sub [ital i]][sup 2] / [ital T][sub [ital c]][sup 2] [minus]1] )] with [xi](0) the zero-temperature correlation length. For very weakly coupled theories, their final size is several times the zero-temperature correlation length. For strongly coupled theories the final size of the domains is comparable to the zero-temperature correlation length and the transition proceeds faster.

• DOE Contract Number: AC02-76ER03066
• OSTI ID: 6518230
• Journal Information: Physical Review, D (Particles Fields); (United States), Vol. 48:2; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
DYNAMICS
DOMAIN STRUCTURE
EQUILIBRIUM
FLUCTUATIONS
GROWTH
HARTREE-FOCK METHOD
QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
SCALAR FIELDS
SELF-CONSISTENT FIELD
TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE
WEAK-COUPLING MODEL
CALCULATION METHODS
FIELD THEORIES
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
MECHANICS
NUCLEAR MODELS
VARIATIONS
662110* - General Theory of Particles & Fields- Theory of Fields & Strings- (1992-)
665000 - Physics of Condensed Matter- (1992-)