Massive renormalization scheme and perturbation theory at finite temperature

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that using a massive renormalization scheme significantly enhances the convergence and stability of perturbation theory calculations at finite temperature, as shown through a scalar field theory example.

Contribution

It introduces a massive renormalization scheme that improves perturbation theory convergence at finite temperature, validated by 2-loop calculations of scalar field pressure.

Findings

Enhanced convergence with the massive scheme

Results align with advanced resummation methods

Stable pressure calculations at stronger couplings

Abstract

We argue that the choice of an appropriate, massive, renormalization scheme can greatly improve the apparent convergence of perturbation theory at finite temperature. This is illustrated by the calculation of the pressure of a scalar field theory with quartic interactions, at 2-loop order. The result, almost identical to that obtained with more sophisticated resummation techniques, shows a remarkable stability as the coupling constant grows, in sharp contrast with standard perturbation theory.