Related papers: The Weight of Vacuum Fluctuations
Zero-point quantum fluctuations of the electromagnetic vacuum create the widely known London-van der Waals attractive force between two atoms. Recently, there was a revived interest in the interaction of rotating matter with the quantum…
We study the Brownian motion of a charged test particle coupled to electromagnetic vacuum fluctuations near a perfectly reflecting plane boundary. The presence of the boundary modifies the quantum fluctuations of the electric field, which…
A huge discrepancy between the zero-point energy calculated from quantum theory and the observed quantity in the Universe has been one of the most illusive problems in physics. In order to examine the measurability of zero-point energy, we…
Quantum fluctuations or other moments of a state contribute to energy expectation values and can imply interesting physical effects. In quantum cosmology, they turn out to be important for a discussion of density bounds and instabilities of…
In this work we review some concepts developed over the last few years: that the gravitational vacuum has, even at scales much larger than the Planck length, a peculiar structure, with anomalously strong and long-lasting fluctuations called…
Physics invites the idea that space contains energy whose gravitational effect approximates that of Einstein's cosmological constant, Lambda; nowadays the concept is termed dark energy or quintessence. Physics also suggests the dark energy…
We propose an effective harmonic oscillator model in order to treat the fluctuations of the gravitational, strong and weak nuclear fields. With respect to the gravitational field, first we use the model to estimate its fluctuating strength,…
Quantum fields possess zero-point or vacuum fluctuations which induce mechanical effects, namely generalised Casimir forces, on any scatterer. Symmetries of vacuum therefore raise fundamental questions when confronted with the principle of…
It is known that the value L of the vacuum energy density affects the propagation equation for gravitons: A mass term appears in the propagation equation, such that m^2=-L. As a consequence, the polarization states of gravitons also change.…
Recently it has been argued that a correct reading of the quantum fluctuations of the vacuum could lead to a solution to the cosmological constant problem. In this work we critically examine such a proposal, finding it questionable due to…
The gravitational energy shift for photons is extended to all mass-equivalent energies $E = mc^2$, obeying the quantum condition $E = h\nu$.On an example of a relativistic binary system, it was shown that the gravitational energy shift…
The fundamental constants of electromagnetism, gravity and quantum mechanics can be related empirically by the numerical approximation $\ln(V_e/V_P)\approx \alpha^{-1}$, where $\alpha$ is the low energy value of the electromagnetic fine…
We study the vacuum radiative corrections to energy levels of a confined electron in quantum rings. The calculations are provided for the Lamb shift of energy levels in low-momentum region of virtual photons and for both one-dimensional and…
A recent proposal asserts that gravitational forces arise due to an interaction between matter and vacuum electromagnetic zero-point radiation. The present analysis demonstrates that forces induced on matter by zero-point radiation arise in…
Following fresh attempts to resolve the problem of the energy density of the vacuum, we reconsider the case where the cosmological constant is derived from a higher-dimensional version of general relativity, and interpret the…
We address issues on the origin of gravity and the cosmological constant problem based on a recent understanding about the correspondence between noncommutative field theory and gravity. We suggest that the cosmological constant problem can…
Quantum gravitational effects in loop quantum cosmology lead to a resolution of the initial singularity and have the potential to solve the horizon problem and generate a quasi scale-invariant spectrum of density fluctuations. We consider…
This is an essay sketching the line of thinking which has led the present author to propose the constituent or atomic model of gravitation more than a decade ago. It turns out that viewing the problem of gravitation as a quantum many body…
We discuss effects of loss of coherence in low energy quantum systems caused by or related to gravitation, referred to as gravitational decoherence. These effects, resulting from random metric fluctuations, for instance, promise to be…
A localized charged particle oscillating near a reflecting boundary is considered as a model for non-cancellation of vacuum fluctuations. Although the mean velocity of the particle is sinusoidal, the velocity variance produced by vacuum…