Gravitational mass-shift effect in the Standard Model

TL;DR

This paper investigates the gravitational mass-shift effect within the Standard Model, analyzing how particle masses vary near black holes and deriving related thermodynamic properties of the vacuum as an ultrarelativistic fluid.

Contribution

It provides a novel analysis of the mass-shift effect in the Standard Model, resolving previous singularity issues and deriving vacuum properties in a black hole background.

Findings

Particle masses depend on the Higgs boson mass in flat spacetime.

Masses increase or decrease near a black hole depending on the Higgs mass range.

Vacuum behaves like an ultrarelativistic fluid with calculable thermodynamic properties.

Abstract

The gravitational mass-shift effect is investigated in the framework of the standard model with the energy cutoff regularization both for stationary and non-stationary backgrounds at the one-loop level. The problem concerning singularity of the effective potential for the Higgs field on the horizon of a black hole, which was reported earlier, is resolved. The equations characterizing the properties of the vacuum state are derived and solved in a certain approximation for the Schwarzschild black hole. The gravitational mass-shift effect is completely described in this case. The masses of the massive particles in the standard model are shown to depend on the value of the Higgs boson mass in the flat spacetime. If the Higgs boson mass in the flat spacetime is less than 263.6 GeV, then the mass of any massive particle approaching a gravitating object grows. If the Higgs boson mass in the flat spacetime is greater than or equal to 278.2 GeV, the masses of all the massive particles decrease in a strong gravitational field. The Higgs boson masses lying in between these two values prove to lead to instability, at least at the one-loop level, and so they are excluded. It turns out that the vacuum possesses the same properties as an ultrarelativistic fluid in a certain approximation. The expression for the pressure, the entropy and enthalpy densities of this fluid are obtained. The sound speed in this fluid is also derived.