Metastable cosmic strings are broken at the start
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arXiv
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| Autori principali: | , , , |
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| Natura: | Preprint |
| Pubblicazione: |
2026
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| _version_ | 1866917189276139520 |
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| author | Tranchedone, Lorenzo Carragher, Ethan Hardy, Edward van IJcken, Natálie Koscelanská |
| author_facet | Tranchedone, Lorenzo Carragher, Ethan Hardy, Edward van IJcken, Natálie Koscelanská |
| contents | We show that metastable cosmic strings break at early times, either via finite-temperature effects or by attaching to pre-existing monopoles during network percolation. The resulting segments can be initially super-horizon in size and thus persist for a significant amount of time. If the strings do not re-percolate, the network's eventual destruction is typically due to this early-time breaking rather than late-time quantum tunnelling. Survival of strings to epochs probed by NANOGrav requires $m_M^2/μ\gtrsim 10^3$, where $m_M$ and $μ$ are the monopole mass and the string tension respectively, over an order of magnitude larger than previous estimates. We also revisit quantum-tunnelling induced breaking. Results from numerical simulations suggest that this occurs mainly at rare high-tension points on the strings, yielding a rate much larger than is usually assumed. We briefly discuss the related scenario of flux tubes in a dark QCD-like hidden sector with dark-quark masses above the confinement scale. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_04320 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2026 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Metastable cosmic strings are broken at the start Tranchedone, Lorenzo Carragher, Ethan Hardy, Edward van IJcken, Natálie Koscelanská High Energy Physics - Phenomenology Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics We show that metastable cosmic strings break at early times, either via finite-temperature effects or by attaching to pre-existing monopoles during network percolation. The resulting segments can be initially super-horizon in size and thus persist for a significant amount of time. If the strings do not re-percolate, the network's eventual destruction is typically due to this early-time breaking rather than late-time quantum tunnelling. Survival of strings to epochs probed by NANOGrav requires $m_M^2/μ\gtrsim 10^3$, where $m_M$ and $μ$ are the monopole mass and the string tension respectively, over an order of magnitude larger than previous estimates. We also revisit quantum-tunnelling induced breaking. Results from numerical simulations suggest that this occurs mainly at rare high-tension points on the strings, yielding a rate much larger than is usually assumed. We briefly discuss the related scenario of flux tubes in a dark QCD-like hidden sector with dark-quark masses above the confinement scale. |
| title | Metastable cosmic strings are broken at the start |
| topic | High Energy Physics - Phenomenology Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.04320 |