Related papers: Light propagation in non-trivial QED vacua
Within the geometric optics approximation, we derive the light cone condition for a class of homogeneous non-trivial QED vacua using the effective action approach. Our result generalizes the ``unified formula'' suggested by Latorre, Pascual…
We examine the propagation of light in the presence of various modifications of the QED vacuum in the limit of low frequency. A polarization summed and direction averaged-light cone condition is derived from the equation of motion which…
Within the QED effective action approach, we study the propagation of low-frequency light at finite temperature. Starting from a general effective Lagrangian for slowly varying fields whose structure is solely dictated by Lorentz covariance…
QED vacua under the influence of external conditions (background fields, finite temperature, boundary conditions) can be considered as dispersive media whose complex behaviour can no longer be described in terms of a single universal vacuum…
We analyze the propagation of light in the context of nonlinear electrodynamics, as it occurs in modified QED vacua. We show that the corresponding characteristic equation can be described in terms of a modification of the effective…
The effects of light propagation in constant magnetic and electric backgrounds are considered in the framework of the effective action approach. We use the exact analytic series representation for the one-loop effective action of QED and…
We unify all existing results on the change of the speed of low--energy photons due to modifications of the vacuum, finding that it is given by a universal constant times the quotient of the difference of energy densities between the usual…
The ability to achieve ultra-strong coupling between light and matter promises to bring about new means to control material properties, new concepts for manipulating light at the atomic scale, and fundamentally new insights into quantum…
Vacuum polarization in QED in a background gravitational field induces interactions which {\it effectively} modify the classical picture of light rays, as the null geodesics of spacetime. These interactions violate the strong equivalence…
We show that QED nonlinear effects imply a phase correction to the linear evolution of electromagnetic waves in vacuum. We provide explicit solutions of the modified Maxwell's equations for the propagation of a superposition of two plane…
Considerable work has been done on the one-loop effective action in combined electromagnetic and gravitational fields, particularly as a tool for determining the properties of light propagation in curved space. After a short review of…
Quantum phenomena such as vacuum polarisation in curved spacetime induce interactions between photons and gravity with quite striking consequences, including the violation of the strong equivalence principle and the apparent prediction of…
A QED-based mechanism, breaking translational invariance of the vacuum at sufficiently small distance scales, is suggested as an explanation for the vacuum energy pressure that accelerates the universe. Very-small-scale virtual vacuum…
In this paper, we consider the evaluation of the effective action for photons coupled to charged scalar fields in the framework of a $(2+1)$-dimensional noncommutative spacetime. In order to determine the noncommutative Maxwell Lagrangian…
Vacuum polarisation in QED in a background gravitational field induces interactions which effectively violate the strong equivalence principle and affect the propagation of light. In the low frequency limit, Drummond and Hathrell have shown…
We want to study the influence of the quantum vacuum on the light propagation. At first, by working in the standard linear quantum theory of the electromagnetic fields, it is shown that the electric permittivity and the magnetic…
In this paper we have shown that squeezed modified quantum vacua have an effect on the background geometry by solving the semi-classical Einstein Field Equations in modified vacuum. The resultant geometry is similar to (anti) de Sitter…
The QED effective action encodes nonlinear interactions due to quantum vacuum polarization effects. While much is known for the special case of electrons in a constant electromagnetic field (the Euler-Heisenberg case), much less is known…
We consider an Einstein-Maxwell action modified by the addition of three terms coupling the electromagnetic strength to the curvature tensor. The corresponding generalized Maxwell equations imply a variation of the speed of light in a…
The construction of low-energy effective actions in QED for several types of external conditions is reviewed. Emphasis is put on the application of these effective actions to a variety of physical effects which represent a manifestation of…