Finite-temperature quantum fields on topologically non-trivial spaces

ASOREY, M.; BENEVENTANO, C.G.; D'ASCANIO, D.; SANTANGELO, E.M.

Santo André, São Paulo

Seminario; Seminários de Física Matemática; 2013

Centro de Matemática, Computação e Cognição, Universidade Federal do ABC

We analyze the behavior of the entropy of conformally coupled scalar fields on some spherical three-dimensional spaces --a problem of cosmological interest. We consider the three-sphere and its (non-simply connected) homogeneous factors. By means of zeta function regularization, we evaluate the effective actions on the whole temperature domain, and we investigate the resulting thermodynamic properties. In particular, we explore the dependence of the entropy on the topological structure of the space. We find that, in the infinite-temperature limit, in addition to the usual Stefan-Boltzmann term, a temperature- and volume-independent contribution appears which only depends on the topology of the space.