Abstract
In the example of the decay of a metastable scalar field state (the conformal vacuum of scalar particles over a false classical vacuum) in the background de Sitter metric, we propose a method to account for the initial quantum field state in the semiclassical calculation of the path integral in a curved space-time. Using this method, we justify the Coleman-De Luccia approach to calculating the decay probability. We interpret the Hawking-Moss instanton as a limit of constrained instantons. We find that the inverse process of the true vacuum going into a false one can occur in the de Sitter space and find the expression for the corresponding probability.
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Translated from Teoreticheskaya i Matematicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 120, No. 3, pp. 451–472, September, 1999.
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Rubakov, V.A., Sibiryakov, S.M. False vacuum decay in the de sitter space-time. Theor Math Phys 120, 1194–1212 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02557243
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02557243