Dynamical aspects of the plane-wave matrix model at finite temperature

We study dynamical aspects of the plane-wave matrix model at finitetemperature. One-loop calculation around general classical vacua is performedusing the background field method, and the integration over the gauge fieldmoduli is carried out both analytically and numerically. In addition to thetrivial vacuum, which corresponds to a single M5-brane at zero temperature, weconsider general static fuzzy-sphere type configurations. They are all 1/2 BPS,and hence degenerate at zero temperature due to supersymmetry. This degeneracyis resolved, however, at finite temperature, and we identify the configurationthat gives the smallest free energy at each temperature. The Hagedorntransition in each vacuum is studied by using the eigenvalue density method forthe gauge field moduli, and the free energy as well as the Polyakov line isobtained analytically near the critical point. This reveals the existence offuzzy sphere phases, which may correspond to the plasma-ball phases in N=4SU(\infty) SYM on S^1 X S^3. We also perform Monte Carlo simulation tointegrate over the gauge field moduli. While this confirms the validity of theanalytic results near the critical point, it also shows that the trivial vacuumgives the smallest free energy throughout the high temperature regime.Comment: 23 pages, 7 figures, LaTeX, JHEP3.cl