ON THE QUANTUM ELECTRODYNAMICS OF A DISPERSIVE MIRROR .1. MASS SHIFTS, RADIATION, AND RADIATIVE REACTION

A one-dimensional model is used to study quantum radiation from an infinitesimally thin jellium-type mirror moving nonrelativistically, with special attention to the effects of dispersion on the spectrum, the mean radiative reaction force F-rad, and the self-mass. Elementary methods suffice throughout. The mirror's position and momentum must be treated, initially, as dynamic variables; afterwards one can treat the velocity beta(t) as an assigned classical parameter. One component Delta M((1)) of the self-mass stems from energy localized on the mirror, interpretable as kinetic energy of the charge carriers induced by the zero-point oscillations of the field; the other component Delta M((2)), related to F-rad, stems from the fields previously emitted by the mirror. Typically of nonrelativistic approximations, the calculated corrections to the rest-energy (Delta M((1))) and to the inertial mass (Delta M((1)) + Delta M((2))) are numerically different, although of the same order. Some integrals over photon frequencies require a cutoff; in the no-cutoff limit Delta M((1)) would diverge logarithmically, but dispersion attenuates high-frequency reflection sufficiently for all other results to remain well defined and finite. In particular, the (delayed) response of F-rad to beta then emerges in closed form. (C) 1995 Academic Press, Inc.