Lattice simulations find the bounce action for metastable cosmic string decay suppressed compared to thin-string estimates, implying faster decay.
Gravitational Waves from Broken Cosmic Strings: The Bursts and the Beads
4 Pith papers cite this work. Polarity classification is still indexing.
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abstract
We analyze the gravitational wave signatures of a network of metastable cosmic strings. We consider the case of cosmic string instability to breakage, with no primordial population of monopoles. This scenario is well motivated from GUT and string theoretic models with an inflationary phase below the GUT/string scale. The network initially evolves according to a scaling solution, but with breakage events resulting from confined monopoles (beads) being pair produced and accelerated apart. We find these ultra-relativistic beads to be a potent source of gravitational waves bursts, detectable by Initial LIGO, Advanced LIGO, and LISA. Indeed, Advanced LIGO could observe bursts from strings with tensions as low as $G\mu \sim 10^{-12}$. In addition, we find that ultra-relativistic beads produce a scale-invariant stochastic background detectable by LIGO, LISA, and pulsar timing experiments. The stochastic background is scale invariant up to Planckian frequencies. This phenomenology provides new constraints and signatures of cosmic strings that disappear long before the present day.
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Metastable cosmic strings produce a gravitational wave background that is best modeled with three parameters (string tension Gμ plus independent time scales t_LB and t_NC), yielding a compact analytical spectrum when t_LB greatly exceeds t_NC.
Thermal effects shift the PTA-compatible parameter region in a minimal dark-sector model to lower dark fine-structure constant and higher monopole-to-string-tension ratio by making thermally induced nucleation the dominant decay channel for metastable Z-strings.
Classical instabilities in metastable strings from two-step symmetry breaking can restrict the viable parameter space for explaining the PTA gravitational wave signal.
citing papers explorer
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The decay rate of metastable cosmic strings beyond the thin-string approximation
Lattice simulations find the bounce action for metastable cosmic string decay suppressed compared to thin-string estimates, implying faster decay.
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New gravitational-wave templates for metastable cosmic strings: Loop breaking versus network collapse
Metastable cosmic strings produce a gravitational wave background that is best modeled with three parameters (string tension Gμ plus independent time scales t_LB and t_NC), yielding a compact analytical spectrum when t_LB greatly exceeds t_NC.
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Thermal Metastable Strings in One-Scale Models and Gravitational Waves
Thermal effects shift the PTA-compatible parameter region in a minimal dark-sector model to lower dark fine-structure constant and higher monopole-to-string-tension ratio by making thermally induced nucleation the dominant decay channel for metastable Z-strings.
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Metastable strings at PTAs: classical stability analysis
Classical instabilities in metastable strings from two-step symmetry breaking can restrict the viable parameter space for explaining the PTA gravitational wave signal.