Numerical Simulations and the Strength of the Electroweak Phase Transition

TL;DR

This paper uses lattice numerical simulations to analyze the strength of the electroweak phase transition in the SU(2) Higgs model, focusing on latent heat and interface tension at finite temperature.

Contribution

It provides the first non-perturbative lattice results on the phase transition strength for Higgs masses below 50 GeV, confirming qualitative agreement with perturbative predictions.

Findings

First-order phase transition characterized by latent heat and interface tension.

Results align qualitatively with two-loop resummed perturbation theory.

Study conducted on $L_t=2$ lattices with Higgs masses below 50 GeV.

Abstract

Numerical simulations are performed to study the finite temperature phase transition in the SU(2) Higgs model on the lattice. The strength of the first order phase transition is investigated by determining the latent heat and the interface tension on $L_t=2$ lattices. The values of the Higgs boson mass presently chosen are below 50 GeV. Our results are in qualitative agreement with two-loop resummed perturbation theory.