The QCD phase transition in the inhomogeneous Universe

Abstract

We investigate a new mechanism for the cosmological QCD phase transition: inhomogeneous nucleation. The primordial temperature fluctuations, measured to be $\delta T/T\sim 10^{-5}$, are larger than the tiny temperature interval, in which bubbles would form in the standard picture of homogeneous nucleation. Thus the bubbles nucleate at cold spots. We find the typical distance between bubble centers to be a few meters. This exceeds the estimates from homogeneous nucleation by two orders of magnitude. The resulting baryon inhomogeneities may affect primordial nucleosynthesis.

Version to appear in Phys. Rev. Lett., 4 pages, 1 figure. Difference to heterogeneous nucleation emphasized, amplitude of temperature fluctuations analyzed in more detail, new length scale l_heat introduced, more complicated geometry of baryon number discussed shortly (relevant for low values of l_heat)

References in corpus (2)

• Phase structure and critical temperature of two-flavor QCD with a renormalization group improved gauge action and clover improved Wilson quark action
• The precision of slow-roll predictions for the CMBR anisotropies

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• Baryon Inhomogeneity Generation in the Quark-Gluon Plasma Phase
• Quark-Hadron Phase Transitions in Brane-World Cosmologies
• Crossover from a continuum study of chiral susceptibility
• Quark-hadron phase transition in a chameleon Brans-Dicke model of brane gravity
• Relics of cosmological quark-hadron phase transition
• Neutron Diffusion and Nucleosynthesis in an Inhomogeneous Big Bang Model
• Basic Treatment of QCD Phase Transition Bubble Nucleation
• Baryon inhomogeneity generation via cosmic strings at QCD scale and its effects on nucleosynthesis
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• A model study of the chiral phase diagram of QCD
• Quark-hadron phase transition in Brans-Dicke brane gravity
• Effect of pre-existing baryon inhomogeneities on the dynamics of quark-hadron transition
• DGP brane cosmology and quark-hadron phase transition
• Assessing the role of the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability at the QCD cosmological phase transition
• QCD phase transition with a power law chameleon scalar field in the bulk
• Baryogenesis via Density Fluctuations with a Second Order Electroweak Phase Transition
• Quark-Hadron Phase Transition in DGP Brane Gravity with Bulk Scalar Field
• Quark-hadron phase transition in DGP including BD brane
• Iso-curvature fluctuations through axion trapping by cosmic string wakes
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• AdS/CFT aspects of the cosmological QCD phase transition
• Quark-hadron phase transition in massive gravity