Electromagnetic Scoot

Abstract

Recent work on scattering of massive bodies in general relativity has revealed that the mechanical center of mass of the system (or, more precisely, its relativistic mass moment) undergoes a shift during the scattering process. We show that the same phenomenon occurs in classical scattering of charged particles in flat spacetime and study the effect in detail. Working to leading order in the interaction, we derive formulas for the initial and final values of the mechanical and electromagnetic energy, momentum, angular momentum, and mass moment. We demonstrate that the change in mechanical mass moment is balanced by an opposite change in the mass moment stored in the electromagnetic field. This is a non-radiative exchange between particles and field, analogous to exchange of kinetic and potential energy. A simple mechanical analogy is a person scooting forward on the floor, who exchanges mass moment with the floor. We therefore say that electromagnetic scattering results in an electromagnetic scoot.

10 pages, 1 figure, matches published version plus a note added

References in corpus (7)

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Cited by in corpus (7)

• Classical Gravitational Observables from the Eikonal Operator
• Angular momentum of zero-frequency gravitons
• Self-force effects in post-Minkowskian scattering
• Comparison of post-Minkowskian and self-force expansions: Scattering in a scalar charge toy model
• Radiation-reaction and angular momentum loss at the second Post-Minkowskian order
• Classical Observables using Exponentiated Spin factors: Electromagnetic Scattering
• Frames and Slicings for Angular Momentum in Post-Minkowski Scattering