Two formalisms, one renormalized stress-energy tensor

TL;DR

This paper compares two formalisms for calculating the renormalized stress-energy tensor of a massless scalar field in (1+1) curved spacetime, establishing their equivalence under certain vacuum state choices to aid semiclassical gravity studies.

Contribution

It provides a clear translation map between the normal-mode and effective action formalisms for the RSET, demonstrating their equivalence for related vacuum states.

Findings

The two formalisms yield identical RSET when related vacuum states are used.

The translation map clarifies how vacuum state choices are encoded in each formalism.

Facilitates comparison of semiclassical effects in gravitational collapse studies.

Abstract

We explicitly compare the structure of the renormalized stress-energy tensor (RSET) of a massless scalar field in a (1+1) curved spacetime as obtained by two different strategies: normal-mode construction of the field operator and one-loop effective action. We pay special attention to where and how it is encoded the information related to the choice of vacuum state in both formalisms. By establishing a clear translation map between both procedures, we show that these two potentially different RSET are actually equal, when using vacuum-state choices related by this map. One specific aim of the analysis is to facilitate the comparison of results regarding semiclassical effects in gravitational collapse as obtained within these different formalisms.