CP VIOLATING METASTABLE STATES AND BARYOGENESIS IN THE HOT STANDARD MODEL

We discuss a novel form of CP violation in the standard model. It takes place at temperatures of the order of the electroweak transition, when two regions with different values of the Wilson line are juxtaposed. This CP violation is maximal. A sufficient condition is simply the existence of a long-lived metastable state; this can occur for fewer than three generations, and also in the minimal supersymmetric standard model. It leads to baryogenesis in all of these models.