2009/04/30 by M. Nouri-Zonoz, Borzoo Nazari
Physics and Astronomy · #Casimir effect #Classical mechanics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Gravitation #Gravitational energy #Gravitational field #Gravity Probe A #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #Physics #Quantum #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect #Quantum electrodynamics #Quantum field theory #Quantum field theory in curved spacetime #Quantum gravity #Quantum mechanics #Spacetime #Theoretical physics #Vacuum energy #Vacuum state #Zero-point energy #gr-qc #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.82.044047
published as Phys.Rev.D82:044047,2010 · 10 pages, RevTex, more typos corrected (combined with arXiv:1003.0614 published in PRD)
openalex publication_date 2010/08/30 · arxiv created 2010/10/06 · arxiv updated 2010/10/07 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
In 1+3 (threading) formulation of general relativity spacetime behaves analogous to a medium with a specific index of refraction with respect to the light propagation. Accepting the reality of zero-point energy, through the equivalence principle, we elevate this analogy to the case of virtual photon propagation in a quantum vacuum in a curved background spacetime. Employing this new idea (conjecture) one could examine the response of vacuum energy to the presence of a weak stationary gravitational field in its different quantum field theoretic manifestations such as Casimir effect and Lamb shift. As an evidence in favor of the proposed conjecture, employing quantum field theory in curved spacetime, we explicitly calculate the effect of a weak static gravitational field on virtual massless scalar particles in a Casimir apparatus. It is shown that, as expected from the proposed conjecture, both the frequency and renormalized energy of the virtual scalar field are affected by the gravitational field through its index of refraction. Generalizations to weak stationary spacetimes and virtual photons are also discussed.