Measuring the boiling point of the vacuum of quantum electrodynamics
Measuring the boiling point of the vacuum of quantum electrodynamics
复制标题
量子电动力学测量真空沸点
DOI：
10.1103/physrevd.99.036008
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发表时间：
2018
影响因子：
5
通讯作者：
N. Tapia
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
A. Hartin;A. Ringwald;N. Tapia
量子电动力学的一个长期存在的重要预言是，它的真空在静态空间均匀电场的背景下是不稳定的，原则上，伴随着电子-正电子对的自发辐射的火花。然而，这一预测的实验验证似乎遥不可及，因为相当大的自发对产生率需要非常强的电场强度。|\mathbf E| ${\rm E}_c=m_e^2/e\simeq 1.3\times 10^{18}\ {\rm V/m}$，其中$m_e$是电子质量，$e$是它的电荷。在这里，我们表明，对生产率的测量，由于在高强度的激光场中的高能量韧致辐射光子的衰变允许的Schwinger临界场的实验测定，从而量子电动力学的真空沸点。
It is a long-standing non-trivial prediction of quantum electrodynamics that its vacuum is unstable in the background of a static, spatially uniform electric field and, in principle, sparks with spontaneous emission of electron-positron pairs. However, an experimental verification of this prediction seems out of reach because a sizeable rate for spontaneous pair production requires an extraordinarily strong electric field strength $|\mathbf E|$ of order the Schwinger critical field, ${\rm E}_c=m_e^2/e\simeq 1.3\times 10^{18}\ {\rm V/m}$, where $m_e$ is the electron mass and $e$ is its charge. Here, we show that the measurement of the rate of pair production due to the decays of high-energy bremsstrahlung photons in a high-intensity laser field allows for the experimental determination of the Schwinger critical field and thus the boiling point of the vacuum of quantum electrodynamics.