Relativistic dynamics compels a thermalized Fermi gas to a unique intrinsic parity eigenstate
Abstract
Dirac equation describes the dynamics of a relativistic spin-1/2 particle regarding its spatial motion and intrinsic degrees of freedom. Here we adopt the point of view that the spinors describe the state of a massive particle carrying two qubits of information: helicity and intrinsic parity. We show that the density matrix for a gas of free fermions, in thermal equilibrium, correlates helicity and intrinsic parity. Our results introduce the basic elements for discussing the spin-parity correlation for a Fermi gas: (1) at the ultra-relativistic domains, when the temperature is quite high, , the fermions have no definite intrinsic parity (50% : 50%), which is maximally correlated with the helicity; (2) at very low temperature, , a unique parity dominates (conventionally chosen positive), by to , while the helicity goes into a mixed state for spin up and down, and the quantum correlation decoheres. For the anti-fermions we get the opposite behavior. In the framework of quantum information, our result could be considered as a plausible explanation of why we do accept, as a fact (consistent with the experimental observation), that fermions (and anti-fermions), in our present epoch of a cool universe, have a unique intrinsic parity. The framework for constructing spin-parity entangled states is established.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1404.5576,
title = {Relativistic dynamics compels a thermalized Fermi gas to a unique intrinsic parity eigenstate},
author = {Alex E. Bernardini and Salomon S. Mizrahi},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1404.5576},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
14 pages, 2 figures