Pair production in a plane wave by thermal background photons

King, B.; Gies, Holger; Piazza, A. Di

doi:10.1103/physrevd.86.125007

Cited by 27 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Above the kinematic threshold this process has cross section approximately equal to the classical size of the electron, σ BW ∼ e 4 /(16π 2 m 2 e ). Averaging this over the distribution of energies present in a thermal bath of photons one finds [77],…”

Section: Electrons and Positronsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Worldline sphaleron for thermal Schwinger pair production

2018

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With increasing temperatures, Schwinger pair production changes from a quantum tunnelling to a classical, thermal process, determined by a worldline sphaleron. We show this and calculate the corresponding rate of pair production for both spinor and scalar quantum electrodynamics, including the semiclassical prefactor. For electron-positron pair production from a thermal bath of photons and in the presence of an electric field, the rate we derive is faster than both perturbative photon fusion and the zero temperature Schwinger process. We work to all-orders in the coupling and hence our results are also relevant to the pair production of (strongly coupled) magnetic monopoles in heavy-ion collisions. * o.gould13@imperial.ac.uk

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Section: Electrons and Positronsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Worldline sphaleron for thermal Schwinger pair production

2018

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“…For weak coupling much has been done to generalise Schwinger's original result, including the effect of temporal and spatial variation in the external field [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9]; the presence of an additional high energy photon or other particle [10][11][12][13][14]; a finite temperature [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24]; higher loops [25][26][27][28][29] and back reaction [30][31][32][33][34]. However, at stronger coupling, where perturbation theory breaks down, much less is known.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thermal Schwinger pair production at arbitrary coupling

Gould

Rajantie

2017

Phys. Rev. D

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We calculate the rate of thermal Schwinger pair production at arbitrary coupling in weak external fields. Our calculations are valid independently of many properties of the charged particles produced, in particular their spin and whether they are electric or magnetic. Using the worldline formalism, we calculate the logarithm of the rate to leading order in the weak external field and to all orders in virtual photon exchange, taking us beyond the perturbative expansion about the leading order, weak coupling result.

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“…This is true even in the long-wavelength limit, λmc/ → ∞, showing the collective, nonperturbative nature of the phenomenon. In this case, the Breit-Wheeler rate is additively enhanced by [53], This result is valid for k B T E/(mc 2 E c ) 1. The crucial difference from that of a constant electric field is that the electromagnetic invariant E 2 − c 2 B 2 of a plane wave vanishes.…”

Section: Theoretical Resultsmentioning

confidence: 64%

Observing thermal Schwinger pair production

et al. 2019

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We study the possibility of observing Schwinger pair production enhanced by a thermal bath of photons. We consider the full range of temperatures and electric field intensities from pure Schwinger production to pure thermal production, and identify the most promising and interesting regimes. In particular we identify temperatures of ∼ 20 keV/k B and field intensities of ∼ 10 23 Wcm −2 where pair production would be observable. In this case the thermal enhancement over the Schwinger rate is exponentially large and due to effects which are not visible at any finite order in the loop expansion. Pair production in this regime can thus be described as more nonperturbative than the usual Schwinger process, which appears at one loop. Unfortunately, such high temperatures appear to be out of reach of foreseeable technologies, though nonthermal photon distributions with comparable energy-densities are possible. We suggest the possibility that similar nonperturbative enhancements may extend out of equilibrium and propose an experimental scheme to test this.

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Pair production in a plane wave by thermal background photons

Cited by 27 publications

References 29 publications

Worldline sphaleron for thermal Schwinger pair production

Worldline sphaleron for thermal Schwinger pair production

Thermal Schwinger pair production at arbitrary coupling

Observing thermal Schwinger pair production

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