Hawking-Moss bounces and vacuum decay rates

TL;DR

This paper critiques the Hawking-Moss approach to vacuum decay, demonstrating that it does not reliably predict transition rates and instead relates to the likelihood of quasistable states at potential maxima.

Contribution

The paper reveals limitations of the Hawking-Moss solution in calculating decay rates and clarifies its interpretation using a nongravitational analogy.

Findings

Hawking-Moss solutions do not provide accurate decay rates.

The HM bounce relates to quasistable configurations at potential maxima.

Transition probabilities depend on more than just potential values at vacua and barriers.

Abstract

The conventional interpretation of the Hawking-Moss (HM) solution implies a transition rate between vacua that depends only on the values of the potential in the initial vacuum and at the top of a potential barrier, leading to the implausible conclusion that transitions to distant vacua can be as likely as those to a nearby one. I analyze this issue using a nongravitational example with analogous properties. I show that such HM bounce do not give reliable rate calculations, but are instead related to the probability of finding a quasistable configuration at a local potential maximum.