Flat direction condensate instabilities in the MSSM

Coherently oscillating scalar condensates formed along flat directions of the MSSM scalar potential are unstable with respect to spatial perturbations if the potential is flatter than φ2, resulting in the formation of non-topological solitons such as Q-balls. Using the renormalization group we calculate the corrections to the φ2 potential for a range of flat directions and show that unstable condensates are a generic feature of the MSSM. Exceptions arise for an experimentally testable range of stop and gluino masses when there are large admixtures of stops in the flat direction scalar.