Local quantum detection of the cosmological expansion: Unruh-DeWitt detectors in spatially compact Milne cosmology

Wilkinson, Adam S.; Louko, Jorma

Abstract

We analyze the excitations and deexcitations of an inertial Unruh-DeWitt detector in the (1+1)-dimensional expanding Milne cosmology with compact spatial sections, coupled to a real massless scalar field with either untwisted or twisted boundary conditions, prepared in the conformal vacuum. We find the detector's response as a function of the energy gap, the Milne spatial circumference parameter, the interaction duration, the age of the Universe at the switch-on moment, the detector's peculiar velocity at the switch-on moment, and, for the untwisted field, the state of the zero mode. Asymptotic analytic results are obtained at large energy gap and at large circumference parameter, in each case recovering the Minkowski vacuum response in the leading order, and in the double limit of small circumference parameter and late cosmological time, recovering the response in a static Minkowski cylinder. Numerical results are given in the interpolating regimes. The results confirm the detector's sensitivity to both classical and quantum properties of its environment.

Citation

Wilkinson, A. S., & Louko, J. (2025). Local quantum detection of the cosmological expansion: Unruh-DeWitt detectors in spatially compact Milne cosmology. Physical Review D, 111(2), Article 025008. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.111.025008

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Oct 23, 2024
• Online Publication Date: Jan 8, 2025
• Publication Date: Jan 8, 2025
• Deposit Date: Jan 9, 2025
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 9, 2025
• Journal: Physical Review D
• Print ISSN: 2470-0010
• Electronic ISSN: 2470-0029
• Publisher: American Physical Society
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 111
• Issue: 2
• Article Number: 025008
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.111.025008
• Keywords: General relativity; Quantum field theory; Quantum fields in curved spacetime
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/43954016
• Publisher URL: https://journals.aps.org/prd/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevD.111.025008