Abstract
We consider—within QED(2)—the backreaction to the Schwinger pair creation in a time dependent, spatially homogeneous electric field. Our focus is the screening of the external field as a quench and the subsequent long-term evolution of the resulting electric field. Our numerical solutions of the self consistent, fully backreacted dynamical equations exhibit a self-sustaining oscillation of both the electric field and the pair number depending on the coupling strength.
Highlights
The Sauter-Schwinger effect is one of the most important examples of strong-field QED phenomena. It refers to the creation of electron-positron pairs by a spatially homogeneous electric field – the decay of the vacuum [1, 2]
This rate is exceedingly small for macroscopic installations, since the Sauter-Schwinger field strength Ec = m2/e = 1.3 × 1018 V/m is so large, while field strengths presently achievable in the lab are of the order of E ≈ 0.01Ec, which results in a huge suppression factor of e−300. (m and e the electron/positron mass and charge; we employ natural units with c = = 1.)
We show the time evolution of the electric field, determined by (9), with the Sauter pulse (12) as external field Eext
Summary
The Sauter-Schwinger effect is one of the most important examples of strong-field QED phenomena It refers to the creation of electron-positron pairs by a spatially homogeneous electric field – the decay of the vacuum [1, 2] (cf [3] for a recent review). The assumption of a constant electric field is not very realistic and a natural generalization is to let it be time dependent This is called the dynamical Schwinger effect. Physical intuition suggests the electrons and positrons will produce a current which will in turn generate a counter-acting electro-magnetic field that gets added to the original one One calls this the backreaction of the fermions on the Maxwell field. We consider the response of the QED(2) vacuum to a quench caused by an external electric field
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