Related papers: CosmoTransitions: Computing Cosmological Phase Tra…
In the traditional view a cosmic first-order phase transition cannot occur without nucleating handful of bubbles in the entire Hubble volume. The presence of domain walls during the transition may, however, significantly alter the dynamics…
Metastable `false' vacuum states are an important feature of the Standard Model of particle physics and many theories beyond it. Describing the dynamics of a phase transition out of a false vacuum via the nucleation of bubbles is essential…
If a theory has more than one classically stable vacuum, quantum tunneling and thermal jumps make the transition between the vacua possible. The transition happens through a first order phase transition started by nucleation of a bubble of…
Despite being at the heart of the theory of the "Big Bang" and cosmic inflation, the quantum field theory prediction of false vacuum tunneling has not been tested. To address the exponential complexity of the problem, a table-top quantum…
Attempts to understand zero temperature phase transitions have forced physicists to consider a regime where the standard paradigms of condensed matter physics break down [1-4]. These quantum critical systems lack a simple description in…
Cosmological phase transitions are predicted by Particle Physics models, and have a variety of important cosmological consequences, which depend strongly on the dynamics of the transition. In this work we investigate in detail the general…
A quantum system can undergo a continuous phase transition at the absolute zero of temperature as some parameter entering its Hamiltonian is varied. These transitions are particularly interesting for, in contrast to their classical finite…
We study bubble-wall dynamics in cosmological first-order phase transitions in a two-scalar-field model, where the wall is formed by $\phi$ and an additional real scalar $s$ couples through a portal interaction. We evolve the coupled…
The sequence of phase transitions during the hot history of the universe is followed within a phenomenological framework. Particular emphasis is put on the QCD confinement transition, which is at reach under earth laboratory conditions. A…
To optimally utilize all the exciting cosmological data coming in we need to sharpen also the theoretical tools available to cosmologists. One such indispensible tool to understand hot big bang cosmology is finite temperature field theory.…
We study how bubbles grow after the initial nucleation event in generic first-order cosmological phase transitions characterised by the values of latent heat, interface tension and correlation length, and driven by a scalar order parameter…
The dynamics of the true-vacuum bubbles nucleated during a first-order phase transition is affected by the distribution functions of the particle species in the plasma, driven out-of-equilibrium by the travelling domain wall. An accurate…
Quantum mechanics makes the otherwise stable vacua of a theory metastable through the nucleation of bubbles of the new vacuum. This in turn causes a first order phase transition. These cosmological phase transitions may have played an…
Classical phase transitions, like solid-liquid-gas or order-disorder spin magnetic phases, are all driven by thermal energy fluctuations by varying the temperature. On the other hand, quantum phase transitions happen at absolute zero…
We investigate quantum phase transitions in two-dimensional superconducting arrays with general capacitance matrices and discrete charge states. We use the perturbation theory together with the simulated annealing method to obtain the…
The dynamics of phase transitions plays a crucial r\^ole in the so-called interface between high energy particle physics and cosmology. Many of the interesting results generated during the last fifteen years or so rely on simplified…
We propose a relationship between thermodynamic phase transitions and ground-state quantum phase transitions in systems with variable Hamiltonian parameters. It is based on a link between zeros of the canonical partition function at complex…
A relatively simple and physically transparent model based on quantum percolation and dephasing is employed to construct a global phase diagram which encodes and unifies the critical physics of the quantum Hall, "two-dimensional…
In the first one of these two lectures, I give an introductory review of phase transitions in finite temperature field theories. I highlight the differences between theories with global and local symmetries, and the similarities between…
Topological defects are thought to be left behind by the cosmological phase transitions which occur as the universe expands and cools. Similar processes can be studied in the phase transitions which take place in the laboratory:…