Spontaneous decay of an excited atom in an absorbing dielectric

Scheel, Stefan; Knöll, L.; Welsch, D.‐G.

doi:10.1103/physreva.60.4094

Cited by 181 publications

(176 citation statements)

References 24 publications

(47 reference statements)

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“…Alternatively, before the continuum limit is taken in (11), we might just remove some small region of the sum around the point where k − j = 1, although the size of this region would also be arbitrary. This problem is reminiscent of that found in the theory of spontaneous emission within an absorbing dielectric, where an additional physical parameter-equivalent to removing a portion of the dielectric in the immediate vicinity of the atom-must be introduced in order to obtain a finite emission rate [23,24].…”

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confidence: 99%

Divergence of Casimir stress in inhomogeneous media

2013

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We examine the local behavior of the regularized stress tensor commonly used in calculations of the Casimir force for a dielectric medium inhomogeneous in one direction. It is shown that the usual expression for the stress tensor is not finite anywhere within the medium, whatever the temporal dispersion or index profile, and that this divergence is unlikely to be removed through a simple modification to the regularization procedure. Our analytic argument is illustrated numerically for a medium approximated as a series of homogeneous strips, as the width of these strips is taken to zero. The findings hold for all magnetodielectric media.

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confidence: 99%

Divergence of Casimir stress in inhomogeneous media

2013

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“…In macroscopic descriptions, local-field effects are frequently taken into account by regarding the guest atom as being enclosed in a virtual [1,10] or real (spherical) cavity [2,11,12,13,14,15] surrounded by the medium, with the cavity size being small compared to the relevant transition wavelength. The cavity in the former model is virtual in the sense that it does not perturb the macroscopic field.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Local-field correction to the spontaneous decay rate of atoms embedded in bodies of finite size

2006

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The influence of the size and shape of a dispersing and absorbing dielectric body on the local-field corrected spontaneous-decay of an excited atom embedded in the body is studied on the basis of the real-cavity model. By means of a Born expansion of the Green tensor of the system it is shown that to linear order in the susceptibility of the body the decay rate exactly follows Tomaš's formula found for the special case of an atom at the center of a homogeneous dielectric sphere [Phys. Rev. A 63, 053811 (2001)]. It is further shown that for an atom situated at the interior of an arbitrary dielectric body this formula remains valid beyond the linear order. The case of an atom embedded in a weakly polarizable sphere is discussed in detail.

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“…The real-cavity model has been applied to the spontaneous decay of an excited atom in a bulk medium [13,15] and at the center of a homogeneous sphere [16]. The local-field corrected decay rate for the latter case was found to be the uncorrected rate multiplied by a global factor and shifted by a constant term.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Local-field correction to one- and two-atom van der Waals interactions

et al. 2007

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Based on macroscopic quantum electrodynamics in linearly and causally responding media, we study the local-field corrected van der Waals potentials and forces for unpolarized ground-state atoms placed within a magnetoelectric medium of arbitrary size and shape. We start from general expressions for the van der Waals potentials in terms of the (classical) Green tensor of the electromagnetic field and the atomic polarizability and incorporate the local-field correction by means of the real-cavity model. In this context, special emphasis is given to the decomposition of the Green tensor into a medium part multiplied by a global local-field correction factor and, in the single-atom case, a part that only depends on the cavity characteristics. The result is used to derive general formulas for the local-field corrected van der Waals potentials and forces. As an application, we calculate the van der Waals potential between two ground-state atoms placed within magnetoelectric bulk material.

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Spontaneous decay of an excited atom in an absorbing dielectric

Cited by 181 publications

References 24 publications

Divergence of Casimir stress in inhomogeneous media

Divergence of Casimir stress in inhomogeneous media

Local-field correction to the spontaneous decay rate of atoms embedded in bodies of finite size

Local-field correction to one- and two-atom van der Waals interactions

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