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A Brazovskii model has a quadratic Fourier kernel minimized on a sphere of nonzero wavevector magnitude. The large phase space of soft modes can prevent the Gaussian mass from vanishing and turn a mean-field continuous transition into a fluctuation-induced first-order transition.

Use the Fourier transform conventionThe zero mode vanishes because the compositional order parameter has zero spatial average. Parseval identity and the Fourier transform of a derivative turn the quadratic part of the dimensionless free energy intoHere ${\sum }_{\mathbf{q}}^{+}$ is the positive-wavevector sum for a real field. Each independent complex amplitude has density proportional to $e^{-G(q)|{\varphi }_{\mathbf{q}}{|}^2}$, so its elementary Gaussian integral gives the static structure factorwhenever $G(q)>0$.

The stationary points of the Brazovskii model kernel obeyBecause $\kappa <0<\gamma$, the nonzero minimum is the nonzero-wavevector soft-mode sphereAt this wavevector,The first Gaussian field theory divergence therefore occurs at

In three dimensions, let $J(q)=r+\gamma (q^2-q_{\ast }^2{)}^2$, with $q_{\ast }>0$ and small $r>0$. Near the soft shell, $J(q)\simeq r+4\gamma q_{\ast }^2(q-q_{\ast }{)}^2$, soThe radial integral uses ${\int }_{-\infty }^{\infty }ds/(r+A{s}^2)=\pi /\sqrt{Ar}$. The $r^{-1/2}$ divergence obstructs the zero-mass limit of a self-consistent Gaussian variational approximation at a fixed nonzero ordering wavevector. This is the mechanism behind the Brazovskii fluctuation-induced first-order transition; Gross, Ignatiev and Chakraborty's study of fluctuation-driven ordering analyzes the corresponding standard Brazovskii model.