The refractive index of curved spacetime: The fate of causality in QED

DOI10.1016/J.NUCLPHYSB.2007.11.034zbMATH Open1219.81251arXiv0707.2303OpenAlexW2077500391MaRDI QIDQ952263FDOQ952263

Authors: Timothy J. Hollowood, Graham M. Shore 

Publication date: 12 November 2008

Published in: Nuclear Physics B (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: It has been known for a long time that vacuum polarization in QED leads to a superluminal low-frequency phase velocity for light propagating in curved spacetime. Assuming the validity of the Kramers-Kronig dispersion relation, this would imply a superluminal wavefront velocity and the violation of causality. Here, we calculate for the first time the full frequency dependence of the refractive index using world-line sigma model techniques together with the Penrose plane wave limit of spacetime in the neighbourhood of a null geodesic. We find that the high-frequency limit of the phase velocity (i.e. the wavefront velocity) is always equal to c and causality is assured. However, the Kramers-Kronig dispersion relation is violated due to a non-analyticity of the refractive index in the upper-half complex plane, whose origin may be traced to the generic focusing property of null geodesic congruences and the existence of conjugate points. This puts into question the issue of micro-causality, i.e. the vanishing of commutators of field operators at spacelike separated points, in local quantum field theory in curved spacetime.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/0707.2303

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zbMATH Keywords

causalitycurved spacequantum electrodynamicsPenrose limitKramers-Kronig dispersion relation

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Quantum field theory on curved space or space-time backgrounds (81T20) Electromagnetic interaction; quantum electrodynamics (81V10)

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Cited In (23)

• The effect of gravitational tidal forces on renormalized quantum fields
• Effective field theories and inflationary magnetogenesis
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• String quantum gravity, Lorentz-invariance violation and gamma ray astronomy
• A new twist on the geometry of gravitational plane waves
• Causality and micro-causality in curved spacetime
• Superluminality, black holes and EFT
• Simplified path integral for supersymmetric quantum mechanics and type-A trace anomalies
• Superluminality and UV completion
• ``Faster than light photons in gravitational fields - causality, anomalies and horizons
• Low-energy electromagnetic radiation as an indirect probe of black-hole evaporation
• Graviton propagation and vacuum polarization in curved space
• The Penrose limit of the Weyl double copy
• The unbearable beingness of light: dressing and undressing photons in black hole spacetimes
• The causal structure of QED in curved spacetime: analyticity and the refractive index
• Global propagation of massive quantum fields in the plane gravitational waves and electromagnetic backgrounds
• The Maslov index and some applications to dispersion relations in curved space times
• Decoherence and CPT violation in a stringy model of space-time foam
• Memory, Penrose limits and the geometry of gravitational shockwaves and gyratons
• Propagation peculiarities of mean field massive gravity
• New techniques for worldline integration
• Dispersion relations and causality: does relativistic causality require thatn(ω) → 1 as ω → ∞ ?
• Quantum mechanical path integrals in curved spaces and the type-A trace anomaly

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