Rayleigh-Ritz Variational Approximation and Symmetry Nonrestoration

Abstract

The investigation of symmetry nonrestoration scenarios has led to a controversy, with certain nonperturbative approximation schemes giving indications in sharp disagreement with those found within conventional perturbation theory. A Rayleigh-Ritz variational approach to the problem, which might be useful in bridging the gap between perturbative and nonperturbative viewpoints, is here proposed. As a first application, this approach is used in the investigation of a $Z_2\times Z_2$-invariant thermal field theory with two scalar fields, placing particular emphasis on the region of parameter space that has been claimed to support symmetry nonrestoration.

9 pages, LaTex. To be published in Physics Letters B

References in corpus (8)

• The Effective Potential and First-Order Phase Transitions: Beyond Leading Order
• 3D Physics and the Electroweak Phase Transition: Perturbation Theory
• Self-consistent Improvement of the Finite Temperature Effective Potential
• On the nature of the electroweak phase transition
• Is there a monopole problem?
• On Symmetry Non-Restoration at High Temperature
• Can Symmetry non-restoration solve the Monopole Problem?
• Self-consistently Improved Finite Temperature Effective Potential for Gauge Theories

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• Large Lepton Number of the Universe and The Fate of Topological Defects
• The U.V. Price for Symmetry Non-Restoration
• The Fading of Symmetry Non-restoration at Finite Temperature
• Inverse Symmetry Breaking on the lattice: an accurate MC study
• The free and safe fate of symmetry non-restoration
• High Temperature Symmetry Breaking via Flat Directions
• Symmetry Nonrestoration in a Gross-Neveu Model with Random Chemical Potential
• A lattice Monte Carlo study of Inverse Symmetry Breaking in a two-scalar model in three dimensions
• Rochelle salt: a prototype of particle physics
• Renormalization Group Naturalness of GUT Higgs Potentials