2003/07/31 by Christopher J. Fewster, C. J. Fewster, B. Mistry +1 · 7 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect #gr-qc #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.68.105010
published as Phys.Rev.D68:105010,2003 · 8 pages, REVTeX4, version to appear in Phys Rev D
arxiv created 2003/09/16 · openalex publication_date 2003/11/25 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Quantum weak energy inequalities (QWEIs) have been established for a variety of quantum field theories in both flat and curved spacetimes. Dirac fields are known (by a result of Fewster and Verch) to satisfy QWEIs under very general circumstances. However this result does not provide an explicit formula for the QWEI bound, so its magnitude has not previously been determined. In this paper we present a new and explicit QWEI bound for Dirac fields of mass m>~0 in four-dimensional Minkowski space. We follow the methods employed by Fewster and Eveson for the scalar field, modified to take account of anticommutation relations. A key ingredient is an identity for Fourier transforms established by Fewster and Verch. We also compare our QWEI with those previously obtained for scalar and spin-1 fields.