{
  "abstract": "We quantify how the treatment of a strongly supercooled phase transition affects the particle-physics interpretation of a nanohertz gravitational-wave signal. For the classically conformal Abelian Higgs model, we calculate the nucleation rate at NLO in the dimensionally reduced theory and test the gradient expansion against explicit fluctuation determinants. A calibrated correction reproduces the determinant exponent with a mean absolute relative difference of $0.8\\%$ and allows this information to be included throughout the parameter scan. We propagate the corrected rate through percolation, reheating and gravitational-wave production, and confront the resulting spectra with the NANOGrav 15-year and IPTA DR2 data. The corrected NLO calculation shifts the preferred gauge coupling by $9\\%$ and $13\\%$, respectively, and the input scale by $18\\%$ for NANOGrav. After the determinant calibration, the largest theoretical uncertainties arise from uncertainties in the gravitational-wave spectra and the relation between $R_\\star$ and $β/H$.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": "2609.12098",
  "author_total": 2,
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Cristina Puchades-Ibáñez"
    },
    {
      "name": "Pedro Schwaller"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/7j7r5t7weqwg8.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.48550/arxiv.2609.12098",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "7j7r5t7weqwg8",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.12098",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "CC-BY-4.0",
  "licence_label": "CC BY 4.0",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": "CC0-1.0",
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "arxiv",
      "gr-qc"
    ],
    [
      "arxiv",
      "hep-ph"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "3103|Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7212683602",
  "pdf_url": "https://arxiv.org/pdf/2609.12098",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-09-10",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/7j7r5t7weqwg8.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:21:07Z",
      "native_id": "2609.12098",
      "source": "arxiv",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.12098"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "physics",
      "origin": "arxiv:gr-qc",
      "subfield": "gravitation"
    },
    {
      "field": "physics",
      "origin": "arxiv:hep-ph",
      "subfield": "high-energy"
    }
  ],
  "title": "The devil in the transition: NLO nucleation and the particle physics behind the PTA signal",
  "title_text": "The devil in the transition: NLO nucleation and the particle physics behind the PTA signal",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:21:07Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/7j7r5t7weqwg8",
  "venue": "arXiv",
  "versions": []
}