A quantum weak energy inequality for Dirac fields in curved spacetime (Q1348980)

In general relativity, it is customary to assume that the stress-energy tensor satisfies some energy inequality which ensure the gravity acts as an attractive force. It is well known that in general quantum fields violate such energy conditions. However, it was shown that for the scalar and electromagnetic fields the weighted averages of the energy density along smooth timelike curves satisfy ``quantum weak energy inequality'' which constitute lower bounds for these quantities. Similar inequality was obtained also for massless Dirac spinor field in two-dimensional space-time. In the paper, the authors establish ``Quantum Weak Energy Inequality'' for Dirac and Majorana spinor fields of non-negative mass on a general four-dimensional globally hyperbolic spacetime. Roughly speaking, it states that the weighted averages of the renormalized energy density along a smooth worldline of an observer is bounded from below. The precise formulation is given in terms of Hadamard states, which are characterized by a microlocal spectrum condition on the wave-front set of the two-point function.