1207.6963 (Damien P. George et al.)

Effective action for the Abelian Higgs model in FLRW    [PDF]

Damien P. George, Sander Mooij, Marieke Postma

We compute the divergent contributions to the one-loop action of the U(1) Abelian Higgs model. The calculation allows for a Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker space-time and a time-dependent expectation value for the scalar field. Treating the time-dependent masses as two-point interactions, we use the in-in formalism to compute the first, second and third order graphs that contribute quadratic and logarithmic divergences to the effective scalar action. Working in R-xi gauge we show that the result is gauge invariant upon using the equations of motion.

View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.6963