On the response of detectors in classical electromagnetic backgrounds

Abstract

I study the response of a detector that is coupled non-linearly to a quantized complex scalar field in different types of classical electromagnetic backgrounds. Assuming that the quantum field is in the vacuum state, I show that, when in {\it inertial} motion, the detector responds {\it only} when the electromagnetic background produces particles. However, I find that the response of the detector is {\it not} proportional to the number of particles produced by the background.

10 pages, LaTeX, Final version

Cited by in corpus (4)

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