Defect formation during a continuous phase transition

Abstract

We study the process of defect formation during a continuous phase transition in an off-critical system. We focus on the spinodal-assisted nucleation regime, where the continuous amplification of density fluctuations induces the pseudo-nucleation of the equilibrium phase. The collision of the different propagating domains produces a domain structure with average domain size and density of defects strongly dependent on the cooling rate. The distribution of the topological defects is in good agreement with the cosmological Kibble-Zurek model proposed to determine the creation of topological defects during a symmetry-breaking phase transition.