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Lifetimes of (near) eternal false vacua

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arxiv 2012.10555 v3 pith:YDCE4KZK submitted 2020-12-19 hep-th

classification hep-th
keywords falsevacuaformlifetimessymmetryexamplesfieldgauge
verification ladder T0 review T1 audit T2 compute T3 formal
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abstract

We consider examples of long-lived false vacua in quantum field theory that arise from so-called `universes'. These false vacua are protected by a $(d-1)$-form global symmetry, where $d$ is the dimension of spacetime. The lifetimes of the false vacua are set by UV data: the tension of $(d-2)$-branes charged under a $(d-2)$-form gauge symmetry. The lifetimes can be made parametrically long even when the difference in energy density between the false and true vacua is large compared to the natural scales of the field theory. We study examples of near-eternal false vacua in abelian gauge theories in two dimensions and in four-dimensional QCD. In both cases, it is possible to view the $(d-1)$-form symmetries as arising from a modification of the sum over instantons. We find that the modification of the instanton sum in 4d QCD leads to a higher-group symmetry structure involving the 3-form and conventional 0-form global symmetries.

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Cited by 5 Pith papers

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