Finite Temperature Nonlocal Effective Action for Scalar Fields

Abstract

Scalar fields at finite temperature are considered in four dimensional ultrastatic curved spacetime. One loop nonlocal effective action at finite temperature is found up to the second order in curvature expansion. This action is explicitly infrared finite. In the high temperature expansion of free energy, essentially nonlocal terms linear in temperature are derived.

Comments: 9 pages, LaTeX (title is changed)