English

Shear and bulk viscosities of a photon gas at low temperature

High Energy Physics - Phenomenology 2013-09-19 v2 Nuclear Theory

Abstract

We explore the viscosities of a photon gas by means of the Euler-Heisenberg effective theory and quantum electrodynamics at zero electron chemical potential. We find parametric estimates that show a very large shear viscosity and an extremely small bulk viscosity (reflecting the very weak coupling simultaneously with a very approximate dilatation invariance). The system is of some interest because it exemplifies very neatly the influence of the breaking of scale invariance on the bulk viscosity.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1307.0476,
  title  = {Shear and bulk viscosities of a photon gas at low temperature},
  author = {Antonio Dobado and Felipe J. Llanes-Estrada and Juan M. Torres-Rincon},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1307.0476},
  year   = {2013}
}

Comments

v2: Typos corrected, one reference updated, one figure added