Unruh effect in vacua with anisotropic scaling: Applications to multilayer graphene

TL;DR

This paper extends the Unruh effect to quantum vacua with anisotropic scaling, particularly in multilayer graphene, revealing non-thermal radiation properties near quantum criticality and discussing potential experimental observations.

Contribution

It introduces a generalized calculation of the Unruh effect for anisotropic scaling vacua, especially applicable to multilayer graphene systems.

Findings

Radiation in anisotropic vacua is non-thermal.

Unruh effect can be observed in multilayer graphene.

Potential experimental realization discussed.

Abstract

We extend the calculation of the Unruh effect to the universality classes of quantum vacua obeying topologically protected invariance under anisotropic scaling ${\bf r} \rightarrow b {\bf r}$, $t \rightarrow b^z t$. Two situations are considered. The first one is related to the accelerated detector which detects the electron - hole pairs. The second one is related to the system in external electric field, when the electron - hole pairs are created due to the Schwinger process. As distinct from the Unruh effect in relativistic systems (where $z=1$) the calculated radiation is not thermal, but has properties of systems in the vicinity of quantum criticality. The vacuum obeying anisotropic scaling can be realized, in particular, in multilayer graphene with the rhombohedral stacking. Opportunities of the experimental realization of Unruh effect in this situation are discussed.