2006/10/06 by Shih-Yuin Lin, B. L. Hu
Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics #Detector #Excited state #Massless particle #Optics #Perturbation (astronomy) #Physics #Quantum #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect #Quantum Mechanics and Applications #Quantum electrodynamics #Quantum field theory #Quantum mechanics #Scalar field #Unruh effect #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s10701-007-9120-1
published as Found.Phys.37:480-490,2007 · 6 pages, invited talk given by SYL at the conference of International Association for Relativistic Dynamics (IARD), June 2006, Storrs, Connecticut, USA
arxiv created 2006/10/06 · openalex publication_date 2007/03/09 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We obtained an exact solution for a uniformly accelerated Unruh-DeWitt detector interacting with a massless scalar field in (3+1) dimensions which enables us to study the entire evolution of the total system, from the initial transient to late-time steady state. We find that the Unruh effect as derived from time-dependent perturbation theory is valid only in the transient stage and is totally invalid for cases with proper acceleration smaller than the damping constant. We also found that, unlike in (1+1)D results, the (3+1)D uniformly accelerated Unruh-DeWitt detector in a steady state does emit a positive radiated power of quantum nature at late-times, but it is not connected to the thermal radiance experienced by the detector in the Unruh effect proper.