Chiral-Symmetry Breaking in Pseudo Quantum Electrodynamics at Finite Temperature
Abstract
We use the Schwinger-Dyson equations in the presence of a thermal bath, in order to study chiral symmetry breaking in a system of massless Dirac fermions interacting through pseudo quantum electrodynamics (PQED3), in (2+1) dimensions. We show that there is a critical temperature Tc, below which chiral symmetry is broken, and a corresponding mass gap is dynamically generated, provided the coupling is above a certain, temperature dependent, critical value αc. The ratio between the energy gap and the critical temperature for this model is estimated to be 2 π. These results are confirmed by analytical and numerical investigations of the Schwinger-Dyson equation for the electron. In addition, we calculate the first finite-temperature corrections to the static Coulomb interaction. The relevance of this result in the realm of condensed matter systems, like graphene, is briefly discussed.