Schwinger pair production in electric and magnetic fields

Journal Article · Wed Mar 15 00:00:00 EST 2006 · Physical Review. D, Particles Fields

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVD.73.065020· OSTI ID:20782691

Kim, Sang Pyo; Page, Don N ^[1]

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1. Department of Physics, Kunsan National University, Kunsan 573-701, Korea and Asia Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics, Pohang 790-784 (Korea, Republic of)

Charged particles in static electric and magnetic fields have Landau levels and tunneling states from the vacuum. Using the instanton method of Phys. Rev. D 65, 105002 (2002), we obtain the formulas for the pair-production rate in spinor and scalar QED, which sum over all Landau levels and recover exactly the well-known results. The pair-production rates are calculated for an electric field of finite extent, and for the Sauter potential, both with a constant magnetic field also present, and are shown to have finite-size effects.

• OSTI ID: 20782691
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 73, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.73.065020; (c) 2006 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
CHARGED PARTICLES
ELECTRIC FIELDS
MAGNETIC FIELDS
PAIR PRODUCTION
POTENTIALS
QUANTUM ELECTRODYNAMICS
SCALARS
TUNNEL EFFECT