Electroweak scale


In particle physics, the electroweak scale, also known as the Fermi scale, is the energy scale around 246 GeV, a typical energy of processes described by the electroweak theory. The particular number 246 GeV is taken to be the vacuum expectation value of the Higgs field. In some cases the term electroweak scale is used to refer to the temperature of electroweak symmetry breaking, 159.5±1.5 GeV
. In other cases, the term is used more loosely to refer to energies in a broad range around 100-1000 GeV.
Interactions may have been above this scale during the electroweak epoch. In the unextended Standard Model, the transition from the electroweak epoch was not a first or a second order phase transition but a continuous crossover, preventing any baryogenesis. However many extensions to the standard model including supersymmetry and the inert double model have a first order electroweak phase transition.