Phase Structure of the 5D Abelian Higgs Model with Anisotropic Couplings

TL;DR

This paper maps the phase diagram of a five-dimensional anisotropic Abelian Higgs model, revealing bulk and layered phases with distinct confinement and symmetry-breaking properties using mean field and Monte Carlo methods.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive analysis of the phase structure of the 5D anisotropic Abelian Higgs model, including layered phases not previously characterized.

Findings

Identification of bulk phases: confining, Coulomb, Higgs

Discovery of layered phases with Coulomb or Higgs layers

Layered phases exhibit confinement in transverse directions

Abstract

We establish the phase diagram of the five-dimensional anisotropic Abelian Higgs model by mean field techniques and Monte Carlo simulations. The anisotropy is encoded in the gauge couplings as well as in the Higgs couplings. In addition to the usual bulk phases (confining, Coulomb and Higgs) we find four-dimensional ``layered'' phases (3-branes) at weak gauge coupling, where the layers may be in either the Coulomb or the Higgs phase, while the transverse directions are confining.