Vacuum structure and effective potential at finite temperature: a variational approach

We compute the effective potential for $\phi^4$ theory with a squeezed coherent state type of construct for the ground state. The method essentially consists in optimising the basis at zero and finite temperatures. The gap equation becomes identical to resumming the infinite series of daisy and super daisy graphs while the effective potential includes multiloop effects and agrees with that obtained through composite operator formalism at finite temperature.Comment: 15 pages, Revtex, No figures, to appear in Jou. of Phys.G(Nucl. and Part. Phys.

A Variational Approach to Bound States in Quantum Field Theory

We consider here in a toy model an approach to bound state problem in a nonperturbative manner using equal time algebra for the interacting field operators. Potential is replaced by offshell bosonic quanta inside the bound state of nonrelativistic particles. The bosonic dressing is determined through energy minimisation, and mass renormalisation is carried out in a nonperturbative manner. Since the interaction is through a scalar field, it does not include spin effects. The model however nicely incorporates an intuitive picture of hadronic bound states in which the gluon fields dress the quarks providing the binding between them and also simulate the gluonic content of hadrons in deep inelastic collisions.Comment: latex, revtex, 22 page

Spin-Charge Decoupling and Orthofermi Quantum Statistics

Currently Gutzwiller projection technique and nested Bethe ansatz are two main methods used to handle electronic systems in the $U$ infinity limit. We demonstrate that these two approaches describe two distinct physical systems. In the nested Bethe ansatz solutions, there is a decoupling between the spin and charge degrees of freedom. Such a decoupling is absent in the Gutzwiller projection technique. Whereas in the Gutzwiller approach, the usual antisymmetry of space and spin coordinates is maintained, we show that the Bethe ansatz wave function is compatible with a new form of quantum statistics, viz., orthofermi statistics. In this statistics, the wave function is antisymmetric in spatial coordinates alone. This feature ultimately leads to spin-charge decoupling.Comment: 12 pages, LaTex Journal_ref: A slightly abridged version of this paper has appeared as a brief report in Phys. Rev. B, Vol. 63, 132405 (2001

Color superconducting 2SC+s quark matter and gapless modes at finite temperatures

We investigate the phase diagram of color superconducting quark matter with strange quarks (2SC+s quark matter) in beta equliibrium at zero as well as finite temperatures within a Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model. The variational method as used here allows us to investigate simultaneous formation of condensates in quark--antiquark as well as in diquark channels. Color and electric charge neutrality conditions are imposed in the calculation of the thermodynamic potential. Medium dependance of strange quark mass plays a sensitve role in maintaining charge neutrality conditions. At zero temperature the system goes from gapless phase to usual BCS phase through an intermediate normal phase as density is increased. The gapless modes show a smooth behaviour with respect to temperature vanishing above a critical temperature which is larger than the BCS transition temperature. We observe a sharp transition from gapless superconducting phase to the BCS phase as density is increased for the color neutral matter at zero temperature. As temperature is increased this however becomes a smooth transition.Comment: 18 pages, 14 figure

Chiral Symmetry Breaking and Pion Wave Function

We consider here chiral symmetry breaking through nontrivial vacuum structure with quark antiquark condensates. We then relate the condensate function to the wave function of pion as a Goldstone mode. This simultaneously yields the pion also as a quark antiquark bound state as a localised zero mode in vacuum. We illustrate the above with Nambu Jona-Lasinio model to calculate different pionic properties in terms of the vacuum structure for breaking of exact or approximate chiral symmetry, as well as the condensate fluctuations giving rise to $\sigma$ mesons.Comment: latex, revtex, 16 page

Spontaneously broken parity and consistent cosmology with transitory domain walls

Domain wall structure which may form in theories with spontaneously broken parity is generically in conflict with standard cosmology. It has been argued that Planck scale suppressed effects can be sufficient for removing such domain walls. We study this possibility for three specific evolution scenarios for the domain walls, with evolution during radiation dominated era, during matter dominated era, and that accompanied by weak inflation. We determine the operators permitted by the supergravity formalism and find that the field content introduced to achieve desired spontaneous parity breaking makes possible Planck scale suppressed terms which can potentially remove the domain walls safely. However, the parity breaking scale, equivalently the majorana mass scale $M_R$ of the right handed neutrino, does get constrained in some of the cases, notably for the matter dominated evolution case which would be generic to string theory inspired models giving rise to moduli fields. One left-right symmetric model with only triplets and bidoublets is found to be more constrainted than another admitting a gauge singlet