Universality and thermalization in the Unruh Effect

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that a uniformly accelerated particle detector in optical cavities thermalizes to the Unruh temperature under various boundary conditions and coupling schemes, provided the switching process is smooth enough, through non-perturbative analysis.

Contribution

It provides a non-perturbative proof that the detector thermalizes to the Unruh temperature regardless of boundary conditions and coupling forms, given smooth switching.

Findings

Detector thermalizes to Unruh temperature with smooth switching

Thermalization is independent of boundary conditions and coupling schemes

Non-perturbative analysis confirms universal thermalization behavior

Abstract

We explore the effects of different boundary conditions and coupling schemes on the response of a particle detector undergoing uniform acceleration in optical cavities. We analyze the thermalization properties of the accelerated detector via non-perturbative calculations. We prove non-perturbatively that if the switching process is smooth enough, the detector thermalizes to the Unruh temperature regardless of the boundary conditions and the form of the coupling considered.