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Poincaré invariance and the Unruh effect

by Alexandre Deur, Stanley J. Brodsky, Craig D. Roberts, Balša Terzić

Submission summary

Authors (as registered SciPost users):

Alexandre Deur

Abstract

We show that the Unruh effect, a well accepted theoretical prediction, is actually absent in a rigorously Poincaré-invariant analysis. This result questions the effect's objective existence. An analogy with classical mechanics, which obeys Galilean invariance rather than Poincaré invariance, is illustrative: non-Galilean frames display pseudoforces; incorporating some (e.g., the Coriolis force), while overlooking others (e.g., the centrifugal force) leads to incorrect conclusions. Galilean frames avoid such pitfalls. Similarly, standard derivations of the Unruh effect are Poincaré-violating and thus incomplete. In contrast, the Poincaré-invariant analysis reported here displays no Unruh effect.

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