The Unruh effect for higher derivative field theory

Abstract

We analyse the emergence of the Unruh effect within the context of a field Lagrangian theory associated with the Pais–Uhlenbeck fourth order oscillator model. To this end, we introduce a transformation that brings the Hamiltonian bounded from below and is consistent with -symmetric quantum mechanics. We find that, as far as we consider different frequencies within the Pais–Uhlenbeck model, a particle together with an antiparticle of different masses are created and may be traced back to the Bogoliubov transformation associated with the interaction between the Unruh–DeWitt detector and the higher derivative scalar field. In contrast, whenever we consider the equal frequencies limit, no particle creation is detected as the pair particle/antiparticle annihilate each other. Further, following Moschella and Schaeffer, we construct a Poincaré invariant two-point function for the Pais–Uhlenbeck model, which in turn allows us to perform the thermal analysis for any of the emanant particles.