Gauge independence of the bubble nucleation rate in theories with radiative symmetry breaking

Journal Article · Mon Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1996 · Physical Review, D

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.53.836· OSTI ID:277474

Metaxas, D; Weinberg, E J ^[1]

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1. Department of Physics, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027 (United States)

In field theories where a metastable false vacuum state arises as a result of radiative corrections, the calculation of the rate of false vacuum decay by bubble nucleation depends on the effective potential and the other functions that appear in the derivative expansion of the effective action. Beginning with the Nielsen identity, we derive a series of identities that govern the gauge dependence of these functions. Using these, we show, to leading nontrivial order, that, even though these functions are individually gauge dependent, one obtains a gauge-independent result for the bubble nucleation rate. Our formal arguments are complemented by explicit calculations for scalar electrodynamics in a class of {ital R}{sub {xi}} gauges. {copyright} {ital 1996 The American Physical Society.}

• OSTI ID: 277474
• Journal Information: Physical Review, D, Journal Name: Physical Review, D Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 53; ISSN PRVDAQ; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

66 PHYSICS
BUBBLES
ELECTRODYNAMICS
EXPANSION
NUCLEATION
RADIATIVE CORRECTIONS
SYMMETRY BREAKING
VACUUM STATES