A quenched-disorder approach with Schwinger-Keldysh path integrals produces an averaged density matrix for gravitational waves that separates phase-suppressing exponential terms from oscillatory corrections to coherent propagation.
Quantum Fluctuations, Decoherence of the Mean Field, and Structure Formation in the Early Universe
4 Pith papers cite this work. Polarity classification is still indexing.
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abstract
We examine from first principles one of the basic assumptions of modern quantum theories of structure formation in the early universe, i.e., the conditions upon which fluctuations of a quantum field may transmute into classical stochastic perturbations, which grew into galaxies. Our earlier works have discussed the quantum origin of noise in stochastic inflation and quantum fluctuations as measured by particle creation in semiclassical gravity. Here we focus on decoherence and the relation of quantum and classical fluctuations. Instead of using the rather ad hoc splitting of a quantum field into long and short wavelength parts, the latter providing the noise which decoheres the former, we treat a nonlinear theory and examine the decoherence of a quantum mean field by its own quantum fluctuations, or that of other fields it interacts with. This is an example of `dynamical decoherence' where an effective open quantum system decoheres through its own dynamics. The model we use to discuss fluctuation generation has the inflation field coupled to the graviton field. We show that when the quantum to classical transition is properly treated, with due consideration of the relation of decoherence, noise, fluctuation and dissipation, the amplitude of density contrast predicted falls in the acceptable range without requiring a fine tuning of the coupling constant of the inflation field ($\lambda$). The conventional treatment which requires an unnaturally small $\lambda \approx 10^{-12}$ stems from a basic flaw in naively identifying classical perturbations with quantum fluctuations.
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2026 4verdicts
UNVERDICTED 4representative citing papers
Develops open EFT for stochastic inflation with a distinct stochastic RG channel, derives nonlocal master equations including Fokker-Planck and Klein-Kramers forms, and demonstrates stochastic renormalization with an analytic regulator.
A manifestly BRST-invariant Schwinger-Keldysh path integral is derived for non-Abelian gauge theories with generic initial states, enabling perturbative Ward-Takahashi-Slavnov-Taylor identities and Open EFT expansions that preserve a contracted Keldysh BRST symmetry.
Decoherence with a hidden environment in fully quantum systems produces effective non-Markovian classical-quantum dynamics, valid when the semi-Wigner operator remains positive semidefinite, reducing to Markovian CQ models in the short-memory limit.
citing papers explorer
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Gravitational-wave lensing beyond rays: a disordered-system approach
A quenched-disorder approach with Schwinger-Keldysh path integrals produces an averaged density matrix for gravitational waves that separates phase-suppressing exponential terms from oscillatory corrections to coherent propagation.
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Stochastic inflation as an open quantum system II: open effective field theory and stochastic matching
Develops open EFT for stochastic inflation with a distinct stochastic RG channel, derives nonlocal master equations including Fokker-Planck and Klein-Kramers forms, and demonstrates stochastic renormalization with an analytic regulator.
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Schwinger-Keldysh Path Integral for Gauge theories
A manifestly BRST-invariant Schwinger-Keldysh path integral is derived for non-Abelian gauge theories with generic initial states, enabling perturbative Ward-Takahashi-Slavnov-Taylor identities and Open EFT expansions that preserve a contracted Keldysh BRST symmetry.
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Emergence of Non-Markovian Classical-Quantum Dynamics from Decoherence
Decoherence with a hidden environment in fully quantum systems produces effective non-Markovian classical-quantum dynamics, valid when the semi-Wigner operator remains positive semidefinite, reducing to Markovian CQ models in the short-memory limit.