Related papers: Migration of Unstable Vacuum for Dissipative Syste…
The description of thermal or non-equilibrium systems necessitates a quantum field theory which differs from the usual approach in two aspects: 1.The Hilbert space is doubled; 2.Stable quasi-particles do not exist in interacting systems. A…
Conventional transport theory is not really applicable to non-equilibrium systems which exhibit strong quantum effects. We present two different approaches to overcome this problem. Firstly we point out how transport equations may be…
A large number of multifaceted quantum transport processes in molecular systems and physical nanosystems can be treated in terms of quantum relaxation processes which couple to one or several fluctuating environments. A thermal equilibrium…
We discuss here phase transitions in quantum field theory in the context of vacuum realignment through an explicit construction. Vacuum destabilisation may occur through a scalar attaining a nonzero expectation value, or through a…
Dynamical evolution of the quantum ground state (vacuum) is analyzed for time variant harmonic oscillators characterized by asymptotically constant frequency. The oscillatory density matrix in the asymptotic future is uniquely determined by…
We present an extension of quantum field theory to the case when the spacetime topology fluctuates (spacetime foam). In this extension the number of bosonic fields becomes a variable and the ground state is characterized by a finite…
We investigate the thermodynamical properties of quantum fields in curved spacetime. Our approach is to consider quantum fields in curved spacetime as a quantum system undergoing an out-of-equilibrium transformation. The non-equilibrium…
We present a construction of non-equilibrium steady states in one-dimensional quantum critical systems carrying energy and charge fluxes. This construction is based on a scattering approach within a real-time hamiltonian reservoir…
The vacuum diagram is calculated at second order for theories with self-interacting massless fields in the framework of finite causal perturbation theory. It is pointed out that the infrared behaviour of the vacuum diagram leads to unstable…
Recent experimental advances in ultrafast phenomena have triggered renewed interest in the dynamics of correlated quantum systems away from equilibrium. We review nonequilibrium dynamical mean-field theory studies of both the transient and…
The description of quantum field systems with meta-stable vacuum is motivated by studies of many physical problems (the decay of disoriented chiral condensate, the resonant decay of CP-odd meta-stable states, self-consistent model of QGP…
We discuss the quantization of an unstable field through the construction of a "one-particle Hilbert space." The system considered here is a neutral scalar field evolving over a globally hyperbolic static spacetime and subject to a…
Quantum dissipation in thermal environment is investigated, using the path integral approach. The reduced density matrix of the harmonic oscillator system coupled to thermal bath of oscillators is derived for arbitrary spectrum of bath…
We study a class of dynamical systems for which the motions can be described in terms of geodesics on a manifold (ordinary potential models can be cast into this form by means of a conformal map). It is rigorously proven that the geodesic…
We define an entropy for a quantum field theory by combining quantum fluctuations, scaling and the maximum entropy concept. This entropy has different behavior in asymptotically free and non--asymptotically free theories. We find that the…
Within the framework of relativistic quantum field theory, a novel method is established which allows to distinguish non-equilibrium states admitting locally a thermodynamic interpretation. The basic idea is to compare these states with…
Real-time perturbation theory is formulated for complex scalar fields away from thermal equilibrium in such a way that dissipative effects arising from the absorptive parts of loop diagrams are approximately resummed into the unperturbed…
The assumption that quantum systems relax to a stationary state in the long-time limit underpins statistical physics and much of our intuitive understanding of scientific phenomena. For isolated systems this follows from the eigenstate…
We show how the state of an unstable particle can be defined in terms of stable asymptotic states. This general definition is used to discuss and to solve some old problems connected with the short-time and large-time behaviour of the…
An oscillating, compact Friedmann universe with a massive conformally coupled scalar field is studied in the framework of quantum cosmology. The scalar field is treated as a perturbation and we look for solutions of the Wheeler-DeWitt…