Destruction of a metastable string by particle collisions

TL;DR

This paper derives a general formula for the probability of a metastable string's destruction by Goldstone boson collisions, revealing it occurs only in even-numbered collisions and analyzing energy dependence in two-particle interactions.

Contribution

It provides a novel general formula for string destruction probability by arbitrary boson collisions, highlighting the exclusive role of even-numbered collisions and detailed energy dependence analysis.

Findings

String destruction occurs only in even-numbered boson collisions.

A general formula for destruction probability is derived.

Energy dependence of two-particle collision process is explicitly calculated.

Abstract

We calculate the probability of destruction of a metastable string by collisions of the Goldstone bosons, corresponding to the transverse waves on the string. We find a general formula that allows to determine the probability of the string breakup by a collision of arbitrary number of the bosons. We find that the destruction of a metastable string takes place only in collisions of even number of the bosons, and we explicitly calculate the energy dependence of such process in a two-particle collision for an arbitrary relation between the energy and the largest infrared scale in the problem, the length of the critical gap in the string.