A Phase Transition in U(1) Configuration Space: Oscillons as Remnants of Vortex-Antivortex Annihilation

Abstract

We show that the low-momentum scattering of vortex-antivortex pairs can lead to very long-lived oscillon states in 2d Abelian Higgs models. The emergence of oscillons is controlled by the ratio of scalar and vector field masses, $\beta =(m_s/m_v{)}^2$ and can be described as a phase transition in field configuration space with critical value ${\beta }_c\simeq 0.13(6)\pm 2$: only models with $\beta <{\beta }_c$ lead to oscillon-like remnants. The critical behavior of the system obeys a power law $O(\beta )\sim |\beta -{\beta }_c{|}^o$, where $O$ is an order parameter indicating the presence of oscillons and $o=0.2(2)\pm 2$ is the critical exponent.

4 pages, 5 figures, LaTeX

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