Radiation Reaction: General approach and applications, especially to electrodynamics

Abstract

Radiation reaction (but, more generally, fluctuations and dissipation) occurs when a system interacts with a heat bath, a particular case being the interaction of an electron with the radiation field. We have developed a general theory for the case of a quantum particle in a general potential (but, in more detail, an oscillator potential) coupled to an arbitrary heat bath at arbitrary temperature, and in an external time-dependent $c$-number field. The results may be applied to a large variety of problems in physics but we concentrate by showing in detail the application to the blackbody radiation heat bath, giving an exact result for radiation reaction problem which has no unsatisfactory features such as the runaway solutions associated with the Abraham-Lorentz theory. In addition, we show how atomic energy and free energy shifts due to temperature may be calculated. Finally, we give a brief review of applications to Josephson junctions, quantum statistical mechanics, mesoscopic physics, quantum information, noise in gravitational wave detectors, Unruh radiation and the violation of the quantum regression theorem

References in corpus (6)

• Entropy of a Quantum Oscillator coupled to a Heat Bath and implications for Quantum Thermodynamics
• Anomalous diffusion in quantum Brownian motion with colored noise
• Limitations on the Utility of Exact Master Equations
• Measured quantum probability distribution functions for Brownian motion
• Consistency of a Causal Theory of Radiative Reaction with the Optical Theorem
• Disentanglement and Decoherence without dissipation at non-zero temperatures

Cited by in corpus (9)

• Aspects of electromagnetic radiation reaction in strong fields
• Transverse spreading of electrons in high-intensity laser fields
• SIMLA: Simulating laser-particle interactions via classical and quantum electrodynamics
• Reduced-order Abraham-Lorentz-Dirac equation and the consistency of classical electromagnetism
• Radiation Reaction of a Jiggling Dipole in a Quantum Electromagnetic Field
• Magnetic mirror cavities as THz radiation sources and a means of quantifying radiation friction
• Radiation Reaction as a Non-conservative Force
• Quantum kinetic theory of flux-carrying Brownian particles
• Electromagnetic self-force for axially symmetric charge on a spherical shell