English

On the Relevance of the Thermal Scalar

High Energy Physics - Theory 2015-01-07 v2

Abstract

We discuss near-Hagedorn string thermodynamics in general spacetimes using the formalism of the thermal scalar. Building upon earlier work by Horowitz and Polchinski, we relate several properties of the thermal scalar field theory (i.e. the stress tensor and U(1) charge) to properties of the highly excited or near-Hagedorn string gas. We apply the formulas on several examples. We find the pressureless near-Hagedorn string gas in flat space and a non-vanishing (angular) string charge in AdS3AdS_3. We also find the thermal stress tensor for the highly excited string gas in Rindler space.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1408.7012,
  title  = {On the Relevance of the Thermal Scalar},
  author = {Thomas G. Mertens and Henri Verschelde and Valentin I. Zakharov},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1408.7012},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

36 pages, v2: section on correlators rewritten and clarifications added, matches published version