Acceleration of Atoms by a Resonance Field

A.Yu. Pusep

Sergey G. Rautian, Gennady I. Smirnov

Wenting Zhou, Roberto Passante, Lucia Rizzuto

We study the resonant dipole–dipole interaction energy between two non-inertial identical atoms, one excited and the other in the ground state, prepared in a correlated Bell-type state, and interacting with the scalar field or the electromagnetic field nearby a perfectly reflecting plate. We suppose the two atoms move with the same uniform acceleration, parallel to the plane boundary, and that their separation is constant during the motion. By separating the contributions of radiation reaction field and vacuum fluctuations to the resonance energy shift of the two-atom system, we show that Unruh thermal fluctuations do not affect the resonance interaction, which is exclusively related to the radiation reaction field. However, non-thermal effects of acceleration in the radiation-reaction contribution, beyond the Unruh acceleration–temperature equivalence, affect the resonance interaction energy. By considering specific geometric configurations of the two-atom system relative to the plate, we show that the presence of the mirror significantly modifies the resonance interaction energy between the two accelerated atoms. In particular, we find that new and different features appear with respect to the case of atoms in the free-space, related to the presence of the boundary and to the peculiar structure of the quantum electromagnetic field vacuum in the locally inertial frame. Our results suggest the possibility to exploit the resonance interaction between accelerated atoms as a probe for detecting the elusive effects of atomic acceleration on radiative processes.

Lucia Rizzuto, Margherita Lattuca, Jamir Marino +4 more

We study the resonance interaction between two uniformly accelerated identical atoms, one excited and the other in the ground state, prepared in a correlated (symmetric or antisymmetric) state and interacting with the scalar field or the electromagnetic field in the vacuum state. In this case (resonance interaction), the interatomic interaction is a second-order effect in the atom-field coupling. We separate the contributions of vacuum fluctuations and radiation reaction to the resonance energy shift of the system, and show that only radiation reaction contributes, while Unruh thermal fluctuations do not affect the resonance interaction. We also find that beyond a characteristic length scale related to the atomic acceleration, nonthermal effects in the radiation-reaction contribution change the distance dependence of the resonance interaction. Finally, we find that previously unidentified features appear, compared with the scalar field case, when the interaction with the electromagnetic field is considered, as a consequence of the peculiar nature of the vacuum quantum noise of the electromagnetic field in a relativistically accelerated background.

M. Saunders, P. L. Halkyard, S. A. Gardiner +1 more

We consider resonant dynamics in a dilute atomic gas falling under gravity through a periodically pulsed standing-wave laser field. Our numerical calculations are based on a Monte Carlo method for an incoherent mixture of noninteracting plane waves, and we show that quantum resonances are highly sensitive to the relative acceleration between the atomic gas and the pulsed optical standing wave. For particular values of the atomic acceleration, we observe fractional resonances. We investigate the effect of the initial atomic momentum width on the fractional resonances and quantify the sensitivity of fractional resonances to thermal effects.

I. P. Zapesochny, О. Б. Шпеник