Using space-time resolved solutions in relativistic quantum field theory we analyze the electron-positron pair creation process from vacuum and resolve the Klein-paradox. We show that there are in principle no limitations to the localization length of an electron and demonstrate that its spatial probability density can be much narrower than the Compton wavelength. We also argue that quantum field theory prohibits the occurrence of Zitterbewegung for an electron in contrast to claims found in textbooks.
Based on space-time-resolved solutions to relativistic quantum field theory we illustrate interpretational difficulties in associating field-theoretical quantities with properties of particles. These difficulties are related to the fact that the definition of the spatial probability density of particles depends on the choice of the Hilbert subspace on which the field operator is projected. We illustrate these problems by analyzing pair-production probabilities and spatial densities for the electron-positron dynamics associated with a spatially localized subcritical potential that is turned on and off in time.
We analyse the degree of two-particle entanglement between an electron and a positron that are created in vacuum in the presence of a supercritical field. This degree of entanglement is determined from the spatially and temporally resolved two-particle wave function calculated from relativistic quantum field theory. Some spin components of the two particles are fully correlated with respect to a simultaneous measurement. However, the positions where the two particles are created by the field can be apart from each other by as much as the Compton wavelength for an extended supercritical field. We calculate the K parameter from the two-particle wave function as a quantitative measure for the degree of entanglement.
We review the steps needed to reduce quantum field theory to quantum mechanics as its limiting case. While processes involving a changing number of particles require a quantum field theoretical description, some works used quantum mechanical data based on the single particle Dirac equation to predict the outcome. These non-quantum field theoretical approaches have led to conceptual controversies that are often related to the negative energy states, which are characteristic of the Dirac equation. As a result, the issues about the physical reality of the relativistic localisation phenomenon, the Zitterbewegung and the Klein paradox are widely discussed in many textbooks. In order to contribute to this discussion, we review recent computer simulations of oversimplified model systems based on quantum field theory. The direct visualisation of intrinsically quantum field theoretical process with full spatial and temporal resolutions can provide us with some first insight into the spontaneous electron–positron pair creation from the vacuum triggered by a strong external (supercritical) force field and with the resolution of the Klein paradox.
Dirac's Relativistic Wave Equation implies a measured electron velocity of
±c in any direction, in contradiction to Special Relativity and observation. It is shown in this article that this anomalous electron velocity reveals an internal structure of the electron whereby the mass and the charge of the electron cannot be described by the same position operator. The measured velocity of electron mass is always less than
c in any direction but charge can be displaced at the speed of light. This speed is realizable only when the electron is in a state that is a superposition of positive and negative energy states, also known as a zitterbewegung state. It is shown that in zitterbewegung it is the charge and not the mass that undergoes rapid spatial oscillation, and that there are measurable consequences of this charge zitterbewegung. Zitterbewegung of charge also occurs in an entangled electron-positron pair created by a strong electric field.
Quantum Electrodynamics may be formulated as a Quantum Field Theory , and also as relativistic quantum mechanics by introduction of the Feynman-Stueckelberg parameter. As stated by M. Srednicki ({\it Quantum Field Theory}, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 2007), "\dots any relativistic quantum physics that can be treated in one formalism can also be treated in the other". Entanglement of electrons at macroscopic spacelike separation has been observed (B. Hensen {\it et al.}, Nature,
526, 2015, doi:10.1038.nature/15759), yet according to Quantum Field Theory is restricted to separations of the order of the Compton wavelength
ℏ/mec (see e.g., S. J. Summers and R. Werner, Commun. Math. Phys.
110,247,1987). There is no restriction on entanglement in parametrized relativistic quantum mechanics (A. F. Bennett, Ann. Phys.
345, 1, 2014). The parametrized formalism is extended here to pair annihilation and pair creation. The {\it ansatz} used in the formalism to develop the correct higher order corrections is justified here with plane wave summations. The conflict over entanglement is further discussed in terms of the Klein-Gordon propagator, and an invariant Bell's inequality is developed for spin -1/2.