All Physics Faculty Publications

On the possibility of gravitationally induced semi-classical vacuum decay

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Physics Letters

Issue

220B

Publication Date

1989

First Page

42

Last Page

47

Abstract

The stability of the vacuum state for a scalar field in curved spacetime with ξRφ2 coupling is considered. It is shown that for negative ξ and zero cosmological constant, it is not possible for a massive free scalar field to tunnel out of the gf=0 vacuum via any O(4) bounce solutions, despite the presence of an apparently unbounded potential caused by gravity in the matter field equation. The comparison of this system with those in the literature is discussed.

https://doi.org/10.1016/0370-2693(89)90010-5

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