English

The (in)stability of global monopoles revisited

High Energy Physics - Phenomenology 2010-11-19 v2 High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

We analyse the stability of global O(3) monopoles in the infinite cut-off (or scalar mass) limit. We obtain the perturbation equations and prove that the spherically symmetric solution is classically stable (or neutrally stable) to axially symmetric square integrable or power-law decay perturbations. Moreover we show that, in spite of the existence of a conserved topological charge, the energy barrier between the monopole and the vacuum is finite even in the limit where the cut-off is taken to infinity. This feature is specific of global monopoles and independent of the details of the scalar potential.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.hep-ph/0003145,
  title  = {The (in)stability of global monopoles revisited},
  author = {Ana Achucarro and Jon Urrestilla},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:hep-ph/0003145},
  year   = {2010}
}

Comments

6 pages, 2 figures (uses RevTeX and epsf). Corrected an error in the original proof of stability, discussion extended to non-normalizable perturbations, one figure slightly modified, minor changes