Eur. Phys. J. C (2017) 77: 412
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-017-4971-x

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

Self-interacting scalar fields at high-temperature

University of Virginia, 22904, Charlottesville, VA, USA

^a deurpam@jlab.org

Received: 2 March 2017
Accepted: 4 June 2017
Published online: 19 June 2017

Abstract

We study two self-interacting scalar field theories in their high-temperature limit using path integrals on a lattice. We first discuss the formalism and recover known potentials to validate the method. We then discuss how these theories can model, in the high-temperature limit, the strong interaction and General Relativity. For the strong interaction, the model recovers the known phenomenology of the nearly static regime of heavy quarkonia. The model also exposes a possible origin for the emergence of the confinement scale from the approximately conformal Lagrangian. Aside from such possible insights, the main purpose of addressing the strong interaction here – given that more sophisticated approaches already exist – is mostly to further verify the pertinence of the model in the more complex case of General Relativity for which non-perturbative methods are not as developed. The results have important implications on the nature of Dark Matter. In particular, non-perturbative effects naturally provide flat rotation curves for disk galaxies, without need for non-baryonic matter, and explain as well other observations involving Dark Matter such as cluster dynamics or the dark mass of elliptical galaxies.