The Physics of Q-balls

Understand

In this thesis we investigate the stationary properties and formation process of a class of nontopological solitons, namely Q-balls.

• We explore both the quantum-mechanical and classical stability of Q-balls that appear in polynomial, gravity-mediated and gauge-mediated potentials.
• By presenting our detailed analytic and numerical results, we show that absolutely stable non-thermal Q-balls may exist in any kinds of the above potentials.
• The latter two types of potentials are motivated by Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, which is one of the best candidate theories to solve the present baryon asymmetry.