The Hartree ensemble approximation revisited: The "symmetric phase"

The Hartree ensemble approximation is studied in the ``symmetric phase'' of 1+1 dimensional lambda phi^4 theory. In comparison with the ``broken phase'' studied previously, it is shown that the dynamical evolution of observables such as the particle distribution, energy exchange and auto-correlation functions, is substantially slower. Approximate thermalization is found only for relatively large energy densities and couplings.Comment: 17 pages RevTeX, 16 figures, 3 tables, uses amsmath and feynmp. Extended some sections, reordered Sec.IV, added 3 refs, numerical typo corrected, published versio

Finiteness of Hot Classical Scalar Field Theory and the Plasmon Damping Rate

We investigate the renormalizability of the classical $\phi^4$ theory at finite temperature. We calculate the time-dependent two point function to two loop order and show that it can be rendered finite by the counterterms of the classical static theory. As an application the classical plasmon damping rate is found to be $\gamma = \lambda^2 T^2/1536 \pi m$. When we use the high temperature expression for $m$ given by dimensional reduction, the rate is found to agree with the quantum mechanical result.Comment: 11 pages, 4 eps figures, minor typographic corrections and two references adde

Staying Thermal with Hartree Ensemble Approximations

We study thermal behavior of a recently introduced Hartree ensemble approximation, which allows for non-perturbative inhomogeneous field configurations as well as for approximate thermalization, in the $\phi^4$ model in 1+1 dimensions. Using ensembles with a free field thermal distribution as out-of-equilibrium initial conditions we determine thermalization time scales. The time scale for which the system stays in approximate quantum thermal equilibrium is an indication of the time scales for which the approximation method stays reasonable. This time scale turns out to be two orders of magnitude larger than the time scale for thermalization, in the range of couplings and temperatures studied. We also discuss simplifications of our method which are numerically more efficient and make a comparison with classical dynamics.Comment: 19 pages latex; extensively rewritten to improve presentation, data essentially unchanged, analysis sharpened and one table adde

Particle distributions in electroweak tachyonic preheating

We consider the out-of-equilibrium (quasi-) particle number distributions of the Higgs and W-fields during electroweak tachyonic preheating. We model this process by a fast quench, and perform classical real-time lattice simulations in the SU(2)-Higgs model in three dimensions. We discuss how to define particle numbers and effective energies using two-point functions in Coulomb and unitary gauge, and consider some of the associated problems. After an initial exponential growth in effective particle numbers, the system stabilises, allowing us to extract effective masses, temperatures and chemical potentials for the particles.Comment: 3 pages, Lattice2003(higgs