Spontaneous rotational symmetry breaking and roton like excitations in gauged σ-model at finite density

The linear sigma-model with a chemical potential for hypercharge is a toy model for the description of the dynamics of the kaon condensate in high density QCD. We analyze the dynamics of the gauged version of this model. It is shown that spontaneous breakdown of SU(2) x U (1)gamma symmetry, caused by the chemical potential, is always accompanied by spontaneous breakdown of both rotational symmetry and electromagnetic U(1)(em). The spectrum of excitations in this model is rich and, because of rotational symmetry breakdown, anisotropic. It is shown that there exist excitation branches that behave as phonon like quasiparticles for small momenta and as roton like ones for large momenta. This suggests that this model can be relevant for anisotropic superfluid systems. (C) 2003 Published by Elsevier B.V.