A Catalog of First-Order Electroweak Phase Transitions in the Standard Model Effective Field Theory

Abstract

We use modern dimensionally-reduced effective field theory methods, with careful attention to scale hierarchies, to analyze and catalog the types of first-order electroweak phase transitions that are possible in the Standard Model Effective Field Theory (SMEFT). Our calculations lay the necessary groundwork to perform gauge invariant, properly resummed perturbative expansions, and therefore address many of the theoretical problems with phase transition calculations. We find three types of configurations of the scalar potential that allow for a first-order phase transition, namely tree-level barriers, radiative barriers, or radiative symmetry breaking through the Coleman-Weinberg mechanism. We also find versions of these with significant supercooling. We perform a global likelihood scan over the Wilson coefficients of SMEFT operators involving only the Higgs field, to identify parameter regions that exhibit these first-order phase transitions and are consistent with experimental and theoretical constraints. We comment on the possibilities for electroweak baryogenesis within the SMEFT, and roughly estimate if the gravitational wave spectra generated by the phase transitions are detectable.