Excited Q-balls in the MSSM with gravity mediated supersymmetry breaking

The relaxation of exited (O) under tilde -balls is studied by numerical sim ulations in the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model with supersymmetry br oken by a gravity mediated mechanism. It is found that there is a suppressi on factor of O(10(-2)) in the rate at which a (Q) under tilde -ball can emi t their excess energy compared to the rate set by the dynamical scale of th e field, m. Furthermore, it is noted that a (O) under tilde -ball can withs tand a large amount of excess energy without losing a significant amount of its charge. The cosmological importance of these properties are considered for (O) under tilde -balls in the thermal bath of the early universe. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.