Speaker
Description
The high-temperature effective field theory (3D EFT) approach to phase transitions relies on the assumption of a power counting which organizes the EFT expansion. Most studies truncate such expansions at superrenormalizable level, yet there is increasing evidence of the relevance of higher-dimensional corrections in the strong transition regime. A consistent treatment of such corrections, preserving gauge and field redefinition invariance, involves the computation of all observables in a strict perturbative expansion. While this program has been succesful in the computation of critical parameters, these higher-order corrections have not yet been explored in the nucleation rate.
In this talk, I will show how to perform a strict perturbative expansion of the nucleation rate, consistent with the EFT power counting. This will allow us to prove invariance under field redefinitions, and to quantify the effect of higher-dimensional operators on this observable. Finally, I shall discuss the computation of the bounce order by order, as well as the evaluation of the action and functional determinants in the bounce background.