Hamburg 2016 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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MP: Fachverband Theoretische und Mathematische Grundlagen der Physik

MP 2: Quantenfeldtheorie im gekrümmten Raum

MP 2.2: Hauptvortrag

Dienstag, 1. März 2016, 14:45–15:30, VMP6 HS B

Unruh effect and Tolman temperature — •Rainer Verch¹ and Detlev Buchholz² — ¹Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Leipzig — ²Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Göttingen

The Unruh effect is often portrayed as due to a thermal gas of non-inertial quantum particles in which an accelerated detector is immersed. Following this heat-bath like interpretation of the Unruh effect, the Unruh temperature of an accelerated detector is often identified with the Tolman temperature of an ideal relativistic gas in a homogeneous, static gravitational field. We show that this interpretation is in conflict with the homogeneity of the quantum field vacuum on Minkowski spacetime, and that there is a modified relation between the Unruh effect temperature and a local (Tolman-like) temperature for a quantum field. As will be pointed out, the discrepancy is due to the fact that the coupling between Unruh detector and quantum field is not only exchanging heat but also energy and particles owing to inevitable quantum fluctuations which arise from the localized coupling between detector and quantum field.