The Unruh Effect in Slow Motion

Symmetry

Silas Vriend¹  Daniel Grimmer²  Eduardo Martín-Martínez³ 

[1] Department of Mathematics & Statistics, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON L8S 4S8, Canada;Faculty of Philosophy, University of Oxford–Reuben College, Oxford OX1 3QP, UK;Institute for Quantum Computing, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada;

关键词: Unruh effect;    experimental proposal;    Collision Models;    Gaussian quantum mechanics;    non-perturbative calculation;   

DOI  :  10.3390/sym13111977

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

We show under what conditions an accelerated detector (e.g., an atom/ion/molecule) thermalizes while interacting with the vacuum state of a quantum field in a setup where the detector’s acceleration alternates sign across multiple optical cavities. We show (non-perturbatively) in what regimes the probe ‘forgets’ that it is traversing cavities and thermalizes to a temperature proportional to its acceleration, the same as it would in free space. Then we analyze in detail how this thermalization relates to the renowned Unruh effect. Finally, we use these results to propose an experimental testbed for the direct detection of the Unruh effect at relatively low probe speeds and accelerations, potentially orders of magnitude below previous proposals.

【 授权许可】

Unknown