2003/09/30 by T. Jacobson, Ted Jacobson, S. Liberati +4 · 8 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #astro-ph #gr-qc #hep-ph #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.93.021101
published as Phys.Rev.Lett.93:021101,2004 · 4 pages; figure replaced; reference added, typo fixed; (v4): added caveat concerning observation of GRB polarization, weakened birefringence bound by factor of ten (due to previous computational error), added references, editorial changes in presentation; v5: Possible role of positrons in producing Crab radiation and effect on constraints noted, reference added, minor editorial changes. Essentially the version published in PRL
openalex publication_date 2004/07/08 · arxiv created 2004/07/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Constraints on possible Lorentz symmetry violation (LV) of order E/MPlanck for electrons and photons in the framework of effective field theory (EFT) are discussed. Using (i) the report of polarized MeV emission from GRB021206 and (ii) the absence of vacuum \ifmmode \checkC\else \vC\fierenkov radiation from synchrotron electrons in the Crab Nebula, we improve previous bounds by 10^\ensuremath-10 and 10^\ensuremath-2, respectively. We also show that the LV parameters for positrons and electrons are different, discuss electron helicity decay, and investigate how prior constraints are modified by the relations between LV parameters implied by EFT.