On the dynamics of phase transitions and the nonequilibrium formation of topological defects
| dc.creator | Stephens, G. J. | |
| dc.date | 2001-06-25 | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2026-07-07T03:44:49Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2026-07-07T03:44:49Z | |
| dc.description | We study the formation of topological defects in nonequilibrium phase transitions of both classical and quantum field theory. We examine three model systems. 1). The phase transition of a quantum scalar field in a FRW universe is analyzed through a first-principles approach in which the dynamics of the two-point function is derived from the two-loop, two-particle-irreducible closed-time-path effective action. Identifying signatures of correlated domains in the infrared portion of the momentum-space power spectrum we find that the domain size scales as a power-law with the expansion rate of the universe. The observed power-law scaling is in good agreement with the predictions of the Kibble-Zurek mechanism of defect formation and provides evidence of the freeze-out scenario in the context of nonequilibrium quantum field theory. 2). The formation and interaction of topological textures is analyzed in the phase transition of a classical O(3) scalar field theory in 2+1 dimensions. We provide quantiive arguments that by the end of the transition the length scales of the texture distribution result from a competition between the length scale determined at freeze-out and the ordering dynamics of a textured system. 3). We discuss a black hole phase transition in semiclassical gravity. We review the thermodynamics of a black hole system and determine that the phase transition is entropically driven. We introduce a quantum atomic model of the equilibrium black hole system and show that the phase transition is realized as the abrupt excitation of a high energy state. We investigate the nonequilibrium dynamics of the black hole phase transition and explore similar examples from the Kosterlitz-Thouless transition in condensed matter to the Hagedorn transition in string theory. | |
| dc.description | Ph.D Thesis, LaTex,108 pages with 32 (included) eps figures | |
| dc.identifier | https://arxiv.org/abs/hep-ph/0106259 | |
| dc.identifier | http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-ph/0106259 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/40722 | |
| dc.subject | High Energy Physics - Phenomenology | |
| dc.subject | Condensed Matter | |
| dc.subject | General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology | |
| dc.title | On the dynamics of phase transitions and the nonequilibrium formation of topological defects | |
| dc.type | text |