English

Matching higher-dimensional operators at finite temperature for general models

High Energy Physics - Phenomenology 2026-05-15 v1

Abstract

High-temperature dimensional reduction provides a systematic effective field theory framework for studying finite-temperature thermodynamics and cosmological phase transitions. While the matching of super-renormalizable operators in the resulting three-dimensional effective theories is well established, the matching of higher-dimensional operators has recently been reinvigorated. These operators become phenomenologically relevant in strong first-order phase transitions where they quantify the convergence of the high-temperature expansion. This work automates the matching of generic three-dimensional dimension-five and -six operators for arbitrary models containing scalars, fermions, and gauge fields, implemented as an extension of the Mathematica package DRalgo. We present the operator basis, the matching procedure, and explicit examples including a scalar-Yukawa model, hot QCD, and the full Standard Model up to dimension six, covering operators mixing the strong and electroweak sectors as well as parity-violating contributions. Redundant operators, gauge dependence, and the corresponding field redefinitions are discussed in detail. The code and example model files are publicly available at https://github.com/DR-algo/DRalgo.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2605.15176,
  title  = {Matching higher-dimensional operators at finite temperature for general models},
  author = {Fabio Bernardo and Romain Guillermo Reinle and Philipp Schicho},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2605.15176},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

35 pages, 2 tables

R2 v1 2026-07-22T07:12:57.473Z