Related papers: A resolution of the cosmological constant problem
Quantum vacuum energy entered hadronic physics through the zero-point energy parameter introduced into the bag model. Estimates of this parameter led to apparent discordance with phenomenological fits. More serious were divergences which…
We study the properties of a class of quantum field theories endowed with an equal number of anti commuting and commuting field variables, the most common example being the supersymmetric models. Based on the scaling properties of the…
The cosmological constant problem arises at the intersection between general relativity and quantum field theory, and is regarded as a fundamental problem in modern physics. In this paper we describe the historical and conceptual origin of…
The renormalization of the vacuum energy in quantum field theory (QFT) is usually plagued with theoretical conundrums related not only with the renormalization procedure itself, but also with the fact that the final result leads usually to…
A diverse set of observations now compellingly suggest that Universe possesses a nonzero cosmological constant. In the context of quantum-field theory a cosmological constant corresponds to the energy density of the vacuum, and the wanted…
The attractive force between metallic surfaces, predicted by Casimir in 1948, seems to indicate the physical existence and measurability of the quantized electromagnetic field's zero-point energy. It is shown in this article, that the…
The contribution of the ground state energy of quantum fields to the cosmological constant is estimated from the point of view of the standard Casimir energy calculation scheme. It is shown that the requirement of the renormalization group…
A mechanism for suppressing the cosmological constant is developed, based on an analogy with a superconducting phaseshift in which free fermions coupled perturbatively to a weak gravitational field are in an unstable false vacuum state. The…
The problem of cosmological constant and vacuum energy is usually thought of as the subject of general relativity. However, the vacuum energy is important for the Universe even in the absence of gravity, i.e. in the case when the Newton…
We study the Casimir problem as the limit of a conventional quantum field theory coupled to a smooth background. The Casimir energy diverges in the limit that the background forces the field to vanish on a surface. We show that this…
The ad-hoc imposition of normal ordering on the Lagrangian, energy-momentum tensor and currents is a standard tool in quantum field theory (QFT) to eliminate infinite vacuum expectation values (v.e.v.) However, for fermionic expressions…
The condensed matter examples, in which the effective gravity appears in the low-energy corner as one of the collective modes of quantum vacuum, provide a possible answer to the question, why the vacuum energy is so small. This answer comes…
We investigate the vacuum polarization and the Casimir energy of a Dirac field coupled to a scalar potential in one spatial dimension. Both of these effects have a common cause which is the distortion of the spectrum due to the coupling…
We consider the standard model with local scale invariance. The theory shows exact scale invariance of dimensionally regulated action. We show that massless gauge fields, which may be abelian or non-abelian, lead to vanishing contribution…
Possible analogies between vacuum state and quantum fluid provide a model to study vacuum energy density induced by thermal corrections, space-time curvature, boundary conditions and quantum back-reaction. We find that vacuum energy density…
A critical look is taken at the calculation of the Casimir effect. The boundary conditions play an important role and should be imposed in a physical way. An acceptable result for the vacuum energy is only obtained when different…
Quantum vacuum energy has been known to have observable consequences since 1948 when Casimir calculated the force of attraction between parallel uncharged plates, a phenomenon confirmed experimentally with ever increasing precision. Casimir…
A model for the localized quantum vacuum is proposed in which the zero-point energy of the quantum electromagnetic field originates in energy- and momentum-conserving transitions of material systems from their ground state to an unstable…
The paper deals with the scale discrepancy between the observed vacuum energy in cosmology and the theoretical quantum vacuum energy (cosmological constant problem). Here, we demonstrate that Einstein's equation and an analogy to particle…
The role of the vacuum, in the Casimir Effect, is a matter of some dispute: the Casimir force has been variously described as a phenomenon resulting "from the alteration, by the boundaries, of the zero-point electromagnetic energy", or a…