Electroweak strings with dark scalar condensates and their stability

Abstract

[EN] The stability of “visible” electroweak-type cosmic strings is investigated in an extension of the Standard Model by a minimal dark sector, consisting of a Uð1Þ gauge field, broken spontaneously by a scalar. The visible and dark sectors are coupled through a Higgs-portal and a gauge-kinetic mixing term. It is found that strings whose core is “filled” with a dark scalar condensate exhibit better stability properties than their analogues in the Standard Model, when the electroweak mixing angle is close to θW ¼ π=2. They become unstable as one lets θW approach its physical value. The instability mechanism appears to be a W-boson condensation mechanism found in previous studies on the stability of electroweak strings.