Photon propagation in slowly varying inhomogeneous electromagnetic fields

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Date

2015-04

Authors

Karbstein, Felix
Shaisultanov, Rashid

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

American Physical Society

Abstract

Starting from the Heisenberg-Euler effective Lagrangian, we determine the photon current and photon polarization tensor in inhomogeneous, slowly varying electromagnetic fields. To this end, we consider background field configurations varying in both space and time, paying special attention to the tensor structure. As a main result, we obtain compact analytical expressions for the photon polarization tensor in realistic Gaussian laser pulses, as generated in the focal spots of high-intensity lasers. These expressions are of utmost importance for the investigation of quantum vacuum nonlinearities in realistic high-intensity laser experiments.

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Keywords

Research Subject Categories::TECHNOLOGY, Photon propagation, electromagnetic fields, photon polarization

Citation

Karbstein, F., & Shaisultanov, R. (2015). Photon propagation in slowly varying inhomogeneous electromagnetic fields. Physical Review D, 91(8). https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.91.085027

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