# Tagged Questions

Quantum-ElectroDynamics (QED) is the quantum field theory believed to describe the electromagnetic interaction (and with some extension the weak nuclear force).

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### Photons, where do they come from? [closed]

Photons, where do they come from? What exactly is a photon? I've certainly heard how they get produced, but it doesn't seem to make sense that some sort of particle should need to be produced just ...
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### What are the limits of applicability of Coulomb's Law?

Coulomb's law is formally parallel to Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation, which is known to give way to General Relativity for very large masses. Does Coulomb's Law have any similar limits of ...
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### Which is this formula Feynman talks about in the QED book?

I am reading the fantastic QED Feynman book. He talks in chapter 3 about a formula he considers too complicated to be written in the book. I would like to know which formula he talks about, although I ...
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### QED photon propagator to one-loop order gets different answers

I'm a self-studying 14-year-old who has a passion for particle physics. I'm currently trying to calculate the QED photon propagator to one loop. However, in all the places I've looked, even with the ...
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### How can an asymptotic expansion give an extremely accurate predication, as in QED?

What is the meaning of "twenty digits accuracy" of certain QED calculations? If I take too little loops, or too many of them, the result won't be as accurate, so do people stop adding loops when the ...
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### What does it mean to erase the which-path information of something?

In this particular case, I am told that very fast measurements erase which-path frequency information of photons. I'm not really sure what that means though. I do not entirely understand the concept ...
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### Can a photon exhibit multiple frequencies?

Can a photon be a superposition of multiple frequency states? Kind of similar to how an electron can be a superposition of multiple spin states.
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### How does this paper relate to standard QED?

This paper proposes a microscopic mechanism for generating the values of $c, \epsilon_0, \mu_0$. They state that their vacuum is assumed to contain ephemeral (meaning existing within the limits of ...
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### How does QED deal with wavelength of quanta [duplicate]

Since QED treats photons as individual units (quanta) how does it treat the concept of the "wavelength" associated with the photon?
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### Why doesn't a stationary electron lose energy by radiating electric field (as per coulomb's law)?

If an electron in a universe constantly generates an electric field why does it not get annihilated ? I am confused because I read that an accelerating charge radiates and loses energy. So, why won't ...
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### Some questions about Ward-Takahashi Identity

I'm a learner of Peskin and Schroeder's textbook of quantum field theory. I have proceeded to Ward-Takahashi identity and have one question when I look for Wikipedia for reference. The following is ...
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### Is it reasonable to interpret the Lamb shift as vacuum induced Stark shifts?

This is a pretty hand-wavy question about interpretation of the Lamb shift. I understand that one can calculate the Lamb shift diagrammatically to get an accurate result, but there exist ...
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### Photon as the carrier of the electromagnetic force

My physics background goes as "far" as reading popsci books on QM, Particle Physics, and Cosmology so pardon my ignorance in the below questions. I've read that the photon is the particle (quanta in ...
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### Does a quadrupole transition mean emission of one photon with spin 2?

If it's true and spin-2 photons do exist, could you please point to some literature that discusses spin-2 photons? If not, then how exactly does a selection rule for quadrupole transition make sense ...
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### Quantum Electrodynamics

I was wondering if anyone could give a simple explanation of how light interacts with matter. From what I have read in QED, electrons will repel each other because of their ability to emit and ...
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### Do EM waves transmit spin polarization?

Suppose you have a normal dipole antennae (transmitter and receiver) . Spin polarized current (as opposed to normal current) is sent into the transmitter, it emits an EM wave and the Receiver receives ...
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### Are there 2 kinds of photons, one that mediate the electromagnetic interaction and the other the quanta of light?

It is usually said that photons are the force carriers or the mediators of the electromagnetic forces between electric charges. At the same time we know also that electromagnetic waves on the quantum ...
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### Did the Feynman heuristic of “simple effects have simple causes” fail for spin statistics?

Someone here recently noted that "The spin-statistics thing isn't a problem, it is a theorem (a demonstrably valid proposition), and it shouldn't be addressed, it should be understood and celebrated." ...
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### Alternative methods to derive the static potential in the NR limit of QED

In QED, one can relate the two-particle scattering amplitude to a static potential in the non-relativistic limit using the Born approximation. E.g. in Peskin and Schroeder pg. 125, the tree-level ...
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### Does light really “travel”?

From what I've so far understood about light, a photon is emitted somewhere and after some time it's absorbed somewhere else. Have we had experiments that confirm the path taken or something akin to ...
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### What starts the movement of a photon

Although a photon has no (rest) mass, it does have a measurable speed. Its movement can be altered by gravity. A photon "travels". If I turn on a flashlight, seen by someone at a distance, the photons ...
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### Why does Quantum Electrodynamics Allow a Photon to Exist Temporarily as a Positron and an Electron?

In this question... Why does a photon colliding with an atomic nucleus cause pair production? ...I asked why a photon colliding with a atomic nucleus can become an electron and a positron. The ...
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### Can the path of a charged particle under the influence of a magnetic field be considered piecewise linear?

Ordinarily we consider the path of a charged particle under the influence of a magnetic field to be curved. However, in order for the trajectory of the particle to change, it must emit a photon. ...
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### Using photons to explain electrostatic force

I am trying to understand the idea of a force carrier with the following example. Let's say there are two charges $A$ and $B$ that are a fixed distance from each other. What is causing the force on ...
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### Database of scattering amplitudes

I want to check whether my result for the invariant amplitude of the electron-electron scattering (to lowest order in $\alpha$; t+u channels) is correct or not. I can't find any reference that has ...
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### Local $U(1)$ gauge invariance of QED

The Lagrangian density for QED is $$\mathcal{L}=-\frac{1}{4}F^{\mu\nu}F_{\mu\nu}+\bar{\psi}(i\gamma^{\mu}D_{\mu}-m)\psi$$ with $$F_{\mu\nu}=\partial_{\mu}A_{\nu}-\partial_{\nu}A_{\mu}$$  ...
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### Ontology of the quantum field

I'll use QED as an example, but my question is relevant to any quantum field theory. When we have a particle in QED, where is its charge contained in the field? Is the field itself charged? If so, ...
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### Vanishing of photon one-point function in QED

I would like to know why the photon one-point function vanishes in QED. I am aware that any $n$-point functions vanishes for odd $n$ because of 'charge-conjugate" argument, this does not apply to ...
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### Two-photon scattering: colours

Is there a particular conservation principle that necessitates that the outcoming photon pair has the same frequencies as the incoming photon pair? I'm thinking in particular of these Feynman-like ...
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### Photons interact with themselves

We know that photons are the antiparticles of themselves and if they interact with each other through higher order process do they annihilate and again produce photons? Here is the Phys.SE question ...
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### Spontaneous breaking of Lorentz invariance in gauge theories

I was browsing through the hep-th arXiv and came across this article: Spontaneous Lorentz Violation in Gauge Theories. A. P. Balachandran, S. Vaidya. arXiv:1302.3406 [hep-th]. (Submitted on 14 ...
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### Field energy of/from virtual Photons

I have a slightly out-of line question: Consider a single electron (or it's current if you please) The EM field surrounding it will (no doubt) have an EM field energy (T) to go with. The standard ...
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### A question on charge renormalization in QED

Let us work with charge renormalization in QED. Consider 2-point photon correlation function $\Pi_2(q^2)$ at one loop level. We normalize the coupling constant at $q^2=0$ (point of normalization). ...
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### Where does the mass term come from in the Proca Lagrangian?

There are many good books describing how to construct the Lagrangian for an electromagnetic field in a medium. $$\mathcal{L}~=~-\frac{1}{16\pi}F^{\mu\nu}F_{\mu\nu}-\frac{1}{c}j^{\nu}A_{\nu}$$ ...
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### Dichroism in uniaxial crystals

I need a same help with it. Some books where i can find a real math explanation of this effect will be good help!! simple exp of this effect will be good too)
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### proof of radius of convergence of perturbation series in quantum electrodynamics zero

Can anyone show detailed proof of why radius of convergence of perturbation series in quantum electrodynamics is zero? And how is perturbation series constructed? So, as this argument requires ...
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### Geometrical significance of gauge invariance of the QED Lagrangian

The QED Lagrangian is invariant under $\psi(x) \to e^{i\alpha(x)} \psi (x)$, $A_{\mu} \to A_{\mu}- \frac{1}{e}\partial_{\mu}\alpha(x)$. What is the geometric significance of this result? Also why is ...
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### Feynman Rules for massive vector boson interactions

I am stuck at the beginning of a problem where I am given an interaction term that modifies the regular QED Lagrangian. It involves the interaction between a photon field and a massive vector boson: ...
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### QED Commutation Relations Implications

In Brian Hatfield's book on QFT and Strings there is the following quote: In particular $$[A_i (x,t), E_j(y,t)] = -i \delta_{ij}\delta(x-y)$$ implies that  [A_i(x,t),\nabla \cdot E(y,t)] = ...
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### Is there a simple way to compute some physical constant from Feynman diagram statistics?

I've been playing around writing some software to generate Feynman diagrams for QED, respecting the vertex "rules" described here, and avoiding creating isomorphic duplicates. So from a starter ...
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### How many particles are created in the strong electromagnetic field?

Consider a vacuum of charged massless scalar field. Then the uniform and isotropic electric field $E$ is turned on for a time interval $\tau$. The question is, how many scalar particles are created? ...
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### The state of Indefinite metric in Quantum Electrodynamics

I faced difficulties to grasp why indefinite metric is introduced from no where in QED, after searching internet I found that this is a problem in QED, because one needs it to preserve theory's ...
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### A thought experiment with Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Could the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle turn out to be false? Thought Experiment Ponder, for a moment, if I had a cube with 10cm sides which I'll name The Box. By ...
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### Is there Pair production in between charged plates

In classical electromagnetic theory, If parallel plates are charged oppositely and placed close to each other, there will be no charge will not flow from one plate to another. How does this situation ...
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### Transparency of solids using bandgaps and relation to conduction and valence bands

I think I understand how a solid can appear transparent as long as the energy of the photons travelling through it are not absorbed in the material's bandgap. But how does this band gap relate to ...
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### When can photon field amplitudes be written as field operators?

Suppose I have some classical field equation for two photon fields with amplitudes $A_1(z),A_2(z)$ (plane waves) given as ${A}_1=\alpha f(A_1,A_2) \\ {{A}_2}=\beta g(A_1,A_2)$ Under what ...
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### Is diffraction affected by interaction between photons and electrons?

Suppose we take a sheet of ordinary metal, make a narrow slit in it, and shine a light beam through the slit onto a screen. The light beam will diffract from the edges of the slit and spread out onto ...
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### Nonlinear refraction index of vacuum above Schwinger limit

This question is more about trying to feel the waters in our current abilities to compute (or roughly estimate) the refraction index of vacuum, specifically when high numbers of electromagnetic quanta ...
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### A step in the derivation of the magnetic momentum of the electron in Zee's QFT book

In chapter III.6 of his Quantum Field Theory in a Nutshell, A. Zee sets out to derive the magnetic moment of an electron in quantum electrodynamics. He starts by replacing in the Dirac equation the ...
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### QED: Would atoms without electrons be visible?

I have been reading a lot of QED books lately, and understand (as well as possible anyway) the interaction between electrons and photons. But I can't seem to get a clear indication of the interaction ...
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