A cascade ofe⁻e⁺pair production by a photon with subsequent annihilation to a single photon in a strong magnetic field

Abstract

The process of electron-positron pair production by a photon with subsequent annihilation to a single photon in a strong magnetic field has been studied. The general amplitude has been calculated and the process rate have been found in the low Landau levels approximation (resonant and nonresonant cases). The comparison of resonant and nonresonant cases shows a significant excess of the resonant rate. The polarization of the final photon in a strong magnetic field has also been found. It has been shown that polarizations of the initial and the final photons are independent except for the case of normal linear polarization of the initial photon.

Electron-Positron Pair Photoproduction in a Strong Magnetic Field Through the Polarization Cascade

“…As one can see from Eqs. (19), the conservation laws for the energy and the longitudinal component of the electron and positron momenta with respect to the magnetic field direction are obeyed. To find the threshold conditions, the following function is introduced:…”

“…Later, this effect was theoretically studied with the help of a polarization tensor in the framework of the Schwinger proper-time method [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]. In works [18,19], the resonant case where the intermediate particles reach the mass shell was analyzed. In work [20], the polarization tensor was studied using Green's function in a magnetic field (the tensor is determined by the summation over the Landau levels in the basis of exact solutions of the Dirac equation).…”

Vacuum Birefringence in a Supercritical Magnetic Field

“…In work [17], scalar functions of the polarization tensor were found numerically for arbitrary magnetic field values and for photons with < 2 . Finally, works [18,19] should be mentioned where the resonance case was considered; namely, virtual intermediate particles reach the mass shell and become real.…”