Moving atom-field interaction: Correction to the Casimir-Polder effect from coherent backaction
- Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742-4111 (United States)
The Casimir-Polder force is an attractive force between a polarizable atom and a conducting or dielectric boundary. Its original computation was in terms of the Lamb shift of the atomic ground state in an electromagnetic field modified by boundary conditions along the wall and assuming a stationary atom. We calculate the corrections to this force due to a moving atom, demanding maximal preservation of entanglement generated by the moving atom-conducting wall system. We do this by using nonperturbative path integral techniques which allow for coherent backaction and thus can treat non-Markovian processes. We recompute the atom-wall force for a conducting boundary by allowing the bare atom-EMF ground state to evolve (or self-dress) into the interacting ground state. We find a clear distinction between the cases of stationary and adiabatic motions. Our result for the retardation correction for adiabatic motion is up to twice as much as that computed for stationary atoms. We give physical interpretations of both the stationary and adiabatic atom-wall forces in terms of alteration of the virtual photon cloud surrounding the atom by the wall and the Doppler effect.
- OSTI ID:
- 20640440
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. A, Vol. 68, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.68.062101; (c) 2003 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1050-2947
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ATOMS
BOUNDARY CONDITIONS
CASIMIR EFFECT
CORRECTIONS
DIELECTRIC MATERIALS
DOPPLER EFFECT
ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELDS
ELECTROMOTIVE FORCE
GROUND STATES
LAMB SHIFT
MARKOV PROCESS
PATH INTEGRALS
PHOTON-ATOM COLLISIONS
PHOTONS