Related papers: Ultrafast Resonant Polarization Interferometry: To…
We propose a novel technique that promises hope of being the first to directly detect a polarization in the quantum electrodynamic (QED) vacuum. The technique is based upon the use of ultra-short pulses of light circulating in low…
We suggest an experiment to observe vacuum birefringence induced by intense laser fields. A high-intensity laser pulse is focused to ultra-relativistic intensity and polarizes the vacuum which then acts like a birefringent medium. The…
Vacuum birefringence is one of the most striking predictions of strong field quantum electrodynamics: Probe photons traversing a strong field region can indirectly sense the applied "pump" electromagnetic field via quantum fluctuations of…
Vacuum birefringence produces a differential phase between orthogonally polarized components of a weak electromagnetic probe in the presence of a strong electromagnetic field. Despite representing a hallmark prediction of quantum…
In vacuum high-intensity lasers can cause photon-photon interaction via the process of virtual vacuum polarization which may be measured by the phase velocity shift of photons across intense fields. In the optical frequency domain, the…
We study the perspectives of measuring the phenomenon of vacuum birefringence predicted by quantum electrodynamics using an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) alone. We devise an experimental scheme allowing the XFEL beam to collide with…
A long-standing prediction of quantum electrodynamics, yet to be experimentally observed, is the interaction between real photons in vacuum. As a consequence of this interaction, the vacuum is expected to become birefringent and dichroic if…
Vacuum birefringence (VB), a fundamental prediction of nonlinear quantum electrodynamics (QED), has eluded direct laboratory detection due to its extreme weakness. We propose a compact, "self-probing" scheme where a GeV electron beam…
Probing vacuum structures deformed by high intense fields is of great interest in general. In the context of quantum electrodynamics (QED), the vacuum exposed by a linearly polarized high-intensity laser field is expected to show…
In this paper we propose an all-optical vacuum birefringence experiment and evaluate its feasibility for various scenarios. Many petawatt-class lasers became operational and many more are expected to enter operation in the near future,…
We discuss the experimental techniques used to date for measuring the changes in polarization state of a laser produced by a strong transverse magnetic field acting in a vacuum. We point out the likely artifacts that can arise in such…
Isolated Neutron Stars are some of the most exciting stellar objects known to astronomers: they have the most extreme magnetic fields, with values up to $10^{15}$ G, and, with the exception of stellar-mass black holes, they are the most…
We present an in-situ method to measure the birefringence of a single vacuum window by means of microwave spectroscopy on an ensemble of cold atoms. Stress-induced birefringence can cause an ellipticity in the polarization of an initially…
Motivated by recent experimental initiatives, such as at the Helmholtz International Beamline for Extreme Fields (HIBEF) at the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL), we calculate the birefringent scattering of x-rays at the combined…
Quantum electrodynamics predicts the vacuum to behave as a non-linear medium, including effects such as birefringence. However, for experimentally available field strengths, this vacuum polarizability is extremely small and thus very hard…
Absorption and dispersion of probe photons in the field of a high-intensity circularly polarized laser wave are investigated. The optical theorem is applied for determining the absorption coefficients in terms of the imaginary part of the…
When exposed to intense electromagnetic fields, the quantum vacuum is expected to exhibit properties of a polarisable medium akin to a weakly nonlinear dielectric material. Various schemes have been proposed to measure such vacuum…
Ninety years after their prediction, quantum vacuum nonlinearities in macroscopic electromagnetic fields still await a direct experimental verification in the laboratory. A particularly promising route towards their first measurement is the…
The focus of this article is on providing compact analytical expressions for the differential number of polarization flipped signal photons constituting the signal of vacuum birefringence in the head-on collision of x-ray free electron…
In a recent paper it is claimed that vacuum birefringence has been experimentally observed for the first time by measuring the degree of polarization of visible light from a Magnetar candidate, a neutron star with a magnetic field…