Schwinger Mechanism Research Articles

Holographic Schwinger effect with a deformed AdS background

In this paper, we consider a deformed AdS background and study the effect of deformation parameter on the pair production rate of the Schwinger effect. The electrostatic potential is important for the pair production in the holographic Schwinger effect. In this paper, we analyze the electrostatic potential in a deformed AdS background and investigate the effect of deformation parameter which may be useful to test the AdS/QCD. In the case of zero temperature, we find that the larger value of the deformation parameter leads to a smaller value of separation length of the test particles on the probe. Also, we find a finite maximum of separation length in the presence of modification parameter.

Particle production in a gravitational wave background

We study the possibility that massless particles, such as photons, are produced by a gravitational wave. That such a process should occur is implied by tree-level, Feynman diagrams such as two gravitons turning into two photons i.e. $g + g \rightarrow \gamma + \gamma$. Here we calculate the rate at which a gravitational wave creates a massless, scalar field. This is done by placing the scalar field in the background of a plane gravitational wave and calculating the 4-current of the scalar field. Even in the vacuum limit of the scalar field it has a non-zero vacuum expectation value (similar to what occurs in the Higgs mechanism) and a non-zero current. We associate this with the production of scalar field quanta by the gravitational field. This effect has potential consequences for the attenuation of gravitational waves since the massless field is being produced at the expense of the gravitational field. This is related to the time-dependent Schwinger effect, but with the electric field replaced by the the gravitational wave background and the electron/positron field quanta replaced by massless scalar "photons". Since the produced scalar quanta are massless there is no exponential suppression as occurs in the Schwinger effect due to the electron mass.

Schwinger pair production at finite temperature

Thermal corrections to Schwinger pair production are potentially important in particle physics, nuclear physics and cosmology. However, the lowest-order contribution, arising at one loop, has proved difficult to calculate unambiguously. We show that this thermal correction may be calculated for charged scalars using the worldline formalism, where each term in the decay rate is associated with a worldline instanton. We calculate all finite-temperature worldline instantons, their actions and fluctuations prefactors, thus determining the complete one-loop decay rate at finite temperature. The thermal contribution to the decay rate becomes nonzero at a threshold temperature $T=eE/2m$, above which it dominates the zero temperature result. This is the lowest of an infinite set of thresholds at $T=neE/2m$. The decay rate is singular at each threshold as a consequence of the failure of the quadratic approximation to the worldline path integral. We argue that that higher-order effects will make the decay rates finite everywhere, and model those effects by the inclusion of hard thermal loop damping rates. We also demonstrate that the formalism developed here generalizes to the case of finite-temperature pair production in inhomogeneous fields.

Holographic Schwinger effect with a moving D3-brane

We study the Schwinger effect with a moving D3-brane in a $\mathcal{N}$=4 SYM plasma with the aid of AdS/CFT correspondence. We discuss the test particle pair moving transverse and parallel to the plasma wind respectively. It is found that for both cases the presence of velocity tends to increase the Schwinger effect. In addition, the velocity has a stronger influence on the Schwinger effect when the pair moves transverse to the plasma wind rather than parallel.

Impact of early stage non-equilibrium dynamics on photon production in relativistic heavy ion collisions

In this study we discuss our results on the spectrum of photons emitted from the quark-gluon plasma produced in heavy ion collisions at RHIC energies. Simulating the space-time evolution of the fireball by solving the relativistic Boltzmann transport equation and including two-particle scattering processes with photon emission allows us to make a first step in the description of thermal photons from the QGP as well as of those produced in the pre-equilibrium stage. Indeed, we consider not only a standard Glauber initial condition but also a model in which quarks and gluons are produced in the very early stage through the Schwinger mechanism by the decay of an initial color-electric field. In the latter approach relativistic kinetic equations are coupled in a self-consistent way to field equations. We aim at spotting the impact of early stage non-equilibrium dynamics on the photon production.

Pair production in near extremal Kerr-Newman black holes

The spontaneous pair production of charged scalars in a near extremal Kerr-Newman (KN) black hole is analytically studied. It is shown that the existence condition for the pair production is equivalent to the violation of the Breitenlohner-Freedman bound in an AdS$_2$ space. The mean number of produced pairs in the extremal black hole has a thermal interpretation, in which the effective temperature for the Schwinger effect in the AdS$_2$ space persistently holds, while the mean number in the near extremal black hole has an additional factor of the Schwinger effect in the Rindler space. In addition, the holographic dual conformal field theory (CFT) descriptions of the charged scalar pair production are respectively realized both in the $J$ and $Q$ pictures in terms of the KN/CFTs correspondence.

Schwinger mechanism in linear covariant gauges

In this work we explore the applicability of a special gluon mass generating mechanism in the context of the linear covariant gauges. In particular, the implementation of the Schwinger mechanism in pure Yang-Mills theories hinges crucially on the inclusion of massless bound-state excitations in the fundamental nonperturbative vertices of the theory. The dynamical formation of such excitations is controlled by a homogeneous linear Bethe-Salpeter equation, whose nontrivial solutions have been studied only in the Landau gauge. Here, the form of this integral equation is derived for general values of the gauge-fixing parameter, under a number of simplifying assumptions that reduce the degree of technical complexity. The kernel of this equation consists of fully-dressed gluon propagators, for which recent lattice data are used as input, and of three-gluon vertices dressed by a single form factor, which is modelled by means of certain physically motivated Ans\"atze. The gauge-dependent terms contributing to this kernel impose considerable restrictions on the infrared behavior of the vertex form factor; specifically, only infrared finite Ans\"atze are compatible with the existence of nontrivial solutions. When such Ans\"atze are employed, the numerical study of the integral equation reveals a continuity in the type of solutions as one varies the gauge-fixing parameter, indicating a smooth departure from the Landau gauge. Instead, the logarithmically divergent form factor displaying the characteristic "zero crossing", while perfectly consistent in the Landau gauge, has to undergo a dramatic qualitative transformation away from it, in order to yield acceptable solutions. The possible implications of these results are briefly discussed.

Implementing quantum electrodynamics with ultracold atomic systems

We discuss the experimental engineering of model systems for the description of quantum electrodynamics (QED) in one spatial dimension via a mixture of bosonic 23Na and fermionic 6Li atoms. The local gauge symmetry is realized in an optical superlattice, using heteronuclear boson–fermion spin-changing interactions which preserve the total spin in every local collision. We consider a large number of bosons residing in the coherent state of a Bose–Einstein condensate on each link between the fermion lattice sites, such that the behavior of lattice QED in the continuum limit can be recovered. The discussion about the range of possible experimental parameters builds, in particular, upon experiences with related setups of fermions interacting with coherent samples of bosonic atoms. We determine the atomic system’s parameters required for the description of fundamental QED processes, such as Schwinger pair production and string breaking. This is achieved by benchmark calculations of the atomic system and of QED itself using functional integral techniques. Our results demonstrate that the dynamics of one-dimensional QED may be realized with ultracold atoms using state-of-the-art experimental resources. The experimental setup proposed may provide a unique access to longstanding open questions for which classical computational methods are no longer applicable.

Critical Schwinger pair production. II. Universality in the deeply critical regime

We study electron-positron pair production by spatially inhomogeneous electric fields. Depending on the localization of the field, a critical point (critical surface) exists in the space of field configurations where the pair production probability vanishes. Near criticality, pair production exhibits universal properties similar to those of continuous phase transitions. We extend results previously obtained in the semiclassical (weak-field) critical regime to the deeply critical regime for arbitrary peak field strength. In this regime, we find an enhanced universality, featuring a unique critical exponent $\ensuremath{\beta}=3$ for all sufficiently localized fields. For a large class of field profiles, we also compute the nonuniversal amplitudes.

ARE FAST RADIO BURSTS THE BIRTHMARK OF MAGNETARS?

ABSTRACT A model of fast radio bursts, which enlists young, short period extragalactic magnetars satisfying B/P > 2 × 1016 G s−1 (1 G = 1 statvolt cm−1) as the source, is proposed. When the parallel component of the surface electric field (under the scenario of a vacuum magnetosphere) of such pulsars approaches 5% of the critical field , in strength, the field can readily decay via the Schwinger mechanism into electron–positron pairs, the back reaction of which causes to oscillate on a characteristic timescale smaller than the development of a spark gap. Thus, under this scenario, the open field line region of the pulsar magnetosphere is controlled by Schwinger pairs, and their large creation and acceleration rates enable the escaping pairs to coherently emit radio waves directly from the polar cap. The majority of the energy is emitted at frequencies where the coherent radiation has the highest yield, at a rate large enough to cause the magnetar to lose spin significantly over a timescale a few s, the duration of a fast radio burst. Owing to the circumstellar environment of a young magnetar, however, the ≲1 GHz radiation is likely to be absorbed or reflected by the overlying matter. It is shown that the brightness of the remaining (observable) frequencies of and above are on a par with a typical fast radio burst. Unless some spin-up mechanism is available to recover the original high rotation rate that triggered the Schwinger mechanism, the fast radio burst will not be repeated again in the same magnetar.

Electron-Positron Pair Production in Strong Fields Characterized by Conversion Energy**Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. 11475026

It is demonstrated that the production mechanism of a pair which is produced from vacuum under an external field can be characterized by its conversion energy, a quantity defined as total mass-energy of this pair. The value of this quantity is checked with quantum field theoretical simulations for several field configurations and it is found that conversion energy can show all the production channels and give the yields of each channel specifically. We detect signatures of effective mass, combination of different photons as well as dynamically assisted Schwinger mechanism and represented more features of these processes in the view of conversion energy.

Mass generation in Yang-Mills theories

In this talk we review recent progress on our understanding of the nonperturbative phenomenon of mass generation in non-Abelian gauge theories, and the way it manifests itself at the level of the gluon propagator, thus establishing a close contact with a variety of results obtained in large-volume lattice simulations. The key observation is that, due to an exact cancellation operating at the level of the Schwinger-Dyson equations, the gluon propagator remains rigorously massless, provided that the fully-dressed vertices of the theory do not contain massless poles. The inclusion of such poles activates the well-known Schwinger mechanism, which permits the evasion of the aforementioned cancellation, and accounts for the observed infrared finiteness of the gluon propagator both in the Landau gauge and away from it.

Scalar current of created pairs by Schwinger mechanism in de Sitter spacetime

We consider a charged scalar field in a $D$-dimensional de Sitter spacetime and investigate pair creation by a Schwinger mechanism in a constant electric field background. Using a semiclassical approximation the current of the created pairs has been estimated. We find that the semiclassical current of the created pairs in the strong electric field limit responds as $E^{\frac{D}{2}}$. Going further but restricting to $D=3$ dimensional de Sitter spacetime, the quantum expectation value of the spacelike component of the induced current has been computed in the in-vacuum state by applying an adiabatic subtraction scheme. We find that, in the strong electric field limit, the current responds as $E^{\frac{3}{2}}$. In the weak electric field limit the current has a linear response in $E$ and an inverse dependence on the mass of the scalar field. In the case of a massless scalar field, the current varies with $E^{-1}$ which leads to a phenomenon of infrared hyperconductivity. A new relation between infrared hyperconductivity, tachyons, and conformality is discussed, and a scheme to avoid an infrared hyperconductivity regime is proposed. In $D$ dimension, we eventually presented some first estimates of the backreaction of the Schwinger pairs to the gravitational field, and we find a decrease of the Hubble constant due to the pair creation.

Schwinger effect, Hawking radiation and Unruh effect

We revisit the Schwinger effect in de Sitter (ds), anti-de Sitter (Ads) spaces and charged black holes, and explore the interplay between quantum electrodynamics (QED) and the quantum gravity effect at one-loop level. We then advance a thermal interpretation of the Schwinger effect in curved spacetimes. Finally, we show that the Schwinger effect in a near-extremal black hole differs from Hawking radiation of charged particles in a nonextremal black hole and is factorized into those in an Ads space and a Rindler space with the surface gravity for acceleration.

Chiral symmetry restoration in heavy-ion collisions at intermediate energies

We study the effect of the chiral symmetry restoration (CSR) on heavy-ion collisions observables in the energy range $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$=3-20 GeV within the Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport approach. The PHSD includes the deconfinement phase transition as well as essential aspects of CSR in the dense and hot hadronic medium, which are incorporated in the Schwinger mechanism for the hadronic particle production. We adopt different parametrizations of the nuclear equation of state from the non-linear $\sigma-\omega$ model, which enter in the computation of the quark scalar density for the CSR mechanism, in order to estimate the uncertainty in our calculations.

The Gribov problem in presence of background field for SU(2) Yang–Mills theory

The Gribov problem in the presence of a background field is analyzed: in particular, we study the Gribov copies equation in the Landau-De Witt gauge as well as the semi-classical Gribov gap equation. As background field, we choose the simplest non-trivial one which corresponds to a constant gauge potential with non-vanishing component along the Euclidean time direction. This kind of constant non-Abelian background fields is very relevant in relation with (the computation of) the Polyakov loop but it also appears when one considers the non-Abelian Schwinger effect. We show that the Gribov copies equation is affected directly by the presence of the background field, constructing an explicit example. The analysis of the Gribov gap equation shows that the larger the background field, the smaller the Gribov mass parameter. These results strongly suggest that the relevance of the Gribov copies (from the path integral point of view) decreases as the size of the background field increases.

Electron-positron pair production in external electric fields varying both in space and time

The Schwinger mechanism of electron-positron pair production in the presence of strong external electric fields is analyzed numerically for the case of one- and two-dimensional field configurations where the external field depends both on time and one spatial coordinate. In order to provide this analysis, a new efficient numerical approach is developed. The number of particles created is obtained numerically and also compared with the analytical results for several exactly solvable one-dimensional backgrounds. For the case of two-dimensional field configurations the effects of the spatial finiteness are examined, which confirms their importance and helps us to attest our approach further. The corresponding calculations are also performed for several more interesting and nontrivial combinations of temporal and spatial inhomogeneities. Finally, we discuss the case of a spatially periodic external field when the approach is particularly productive. The method employed is described in detail.

Holographic Schwinger effect and chiral condensate in SYM theory

We study the instability, for the supersymmetric Yang-Mills (SYM) theories, caused by the external electric field through the imaginary part of the action of the D7 probe brane, which is embedded in the background of type IIB theory. This instability is related to the Schwinger effect, namely to the quark pair production due to the external electric field, for the $SU(N_c)$ SYM theories. In this holographic approach, it is possible to calculate the Schwinger effect for various phases of the theories. Here we give the calculation for ${\cal N}=2$ SYM theory and the analysis is extended to the finite temperature deconfinement and the zero temperature confinement phases of the Yang-Mills (YM) theory. By comparing the obtained production rates with the one of the supersymmetric case, the dynamical quark mass is estimated and we find how it varies with the chiral condensate. Based on this analysis, we give a speculation on the extension of the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model to the finite temperature YM theory, and four fermi coupling is evaluated in the confinement theory.

Spatially Assisted Schwinger Mechanism and Magnetic Catalysis

Using the worldline formalism we compute an effective action for fermions under a temporally modulated electric field and a spatially modulated magnetic field. It is known that the former leads to an enhanced Schwinger mechanism, while we find that the latter can also result in enhanced particle production and even cause a reorganization of the vacuum to acquire a larger dynamical mass in equilibrium which spatially assists the magnetic catalysis.

(Anti-)strangeness in heavy-ion collisions

We study the production of hadrons in nucleus-nucleus collisions within the Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport approach that is extended to incorporate essentials aspects of chiral symmetry restoration (CSR) in the hadronic sector (via the Schwinger mechanism) on top of the deconfinement phase transition as implemented in PHSD before. The essential impact of CSR is found in the Schwinger mechanism (for string decay) which fixes the ratio of strange to light quark production in the hadronic medium. Our studies suggest a microscopic explanation for the maximum in the K+ /π+ and (Ʌ + Σ0)/π- ratios at about 30 A GeV which only shows up if in addition to CSR a deconfinement transition to partonic degrees-of-freedom is incorporated in the reaction dynamics.