Quantum radiation force on the moving mirror of a cavity, with Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions for a vacuum, finite temperature, and a coherent state

Danilo T. Alves, Edney R. Granhen, Hector O. Silva, Mateus G. Lima

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

We consider a real massless scalar field inside a cavity with a moving mirror in a two-dimensional spacetime, satisfying the Dirichlet or Neumann boundary condition at the instantaneous position of the boundaries, for an arbitrary and relativistic law of motion. Considering an arbitrary initial field state, we show that the exact value of the energy density in the cavity can be obtained by tracing back a sequence of null lines, connecting the value of the energy density at the given spacetime point to a certain known value of the energy density at a point in the region where the initial field modes are not affected by the boundary motion. We obtain the particular formulas for the energy density of the field and the quantum force acting on the boundaries for a vacuum, thermal, and a coherent state. We thus generalize a previous result in literature, where this problem is approached for only one mirror. For the particular cases of vacuum and Dirichlet boundary condition, nonrelativistic velocities, or in the limit of large length of the cavity, our results coincide with those found in the literature.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number025016
JournalPhysical Review D - Particles, Fields, Gravitation and Cosmology
Volume81
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 15 2010
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Nuclear and High Energy Physics
  • Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)

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