Electrostatic self-interaction in the spacetime of a global monopole with finite core

Abstract

In this paper we calculate the induced electrostatic self-energy and self-force for an electrically charged particle placed at rest in the spacetime of a global monopole admitting a general spherically symmetric inner structure to it. In order to develop this analysis we calculate the three-dimensional Green function associated with this physical system. We explicitly show that for points outside the monopole's core the self-energy presents two distinct contributions. The first is induced by the non-trivial topology of the global monopole considered as a point-like object. The second is a correction induced by the non-vanishing inner structure attributed to it. As an illustration of the general procedure the flower-pot model for the region inside the monopole is considered. In this application it is also possible to find the electrostatic self-energy for points in the region inside the monopole. In the geometry of the global monopole with the positive solid angle deficit, we show that for the flower-pot model the electrostatic self-force is repulsive with respect to the core surface for both exterior and interior regions.