Vacuum polarization near boundaries
arXiv:2010.05499 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.103.016012
Abstract
We study the effect of boundary conditions on vacuum polarization for charged scalar fields in two space-time dimensions. We find that both Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions lead to screening. In the Dirichlet case, the vacuum polarization charge density vanishes at the boundary, whereas it attains its maximum there for Neumann boundary conditions. At a critical field strength, the vacuum polarization diverges for Neumann boundary conditions, an effect due to the instability of the lowest energy mode in the presence of the external field.
arXiv commentv2: Some clarifications & new section on nonperturbative results. Final version
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