Instability of nonminimally coupled scalar fields in the spacetime of thin charged shells

TL;DR

This paper studies the stability of a nonminimally coupled scalar field in the curved spacetime of a charged thin shell, extending previous work on vacuum fluctuations in massive shell spacetimes.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of scalar field stability in charged shell spacetimes, incorporating nonminimal coupling effects in a quantum field theory framework.

Findings

Identifies conditions for scalar field instability in charged shell spacetimes.

Extends previous analyses by including nonminimal coupling effects.

Provides insights into quantum vacuum fluctuations near charged shells.

Abstract

We investigate the stability of a free scalar field nonminimally coupled to gravity under linear perturbations in the spacetime of a charged spherical shell. Our analysis is performed in the context of quantum field theory in curved spacetimes. This paper completes previous analyses which considered the exponential enhancement of vacuum fluctuations in the spacetime of massive shells.