Thermal Bosonic and Fermionic Quantum Fields in Static Background Gauge Potentials

Abstract

We study at finite temperature the energy-momentum tensor $T_{\mu\nu}(x)$ of (i) a scalar field in arbitrary dimension, and (ii) a spinor field in 1+1 dimensions, interacting with a static background electromagnetic field. $T_{\mu\nu}$ separates into an UV divergent part $T_{\mu\nu}^{sea}$ representing the virtual sea, and an UV finite part $T_{\mu\nu}^{plasma}$ describing the thermal plasma of the matter field. $T_{\mu\nu}^{sea}$ remains uniform in the presence of a \underbar{uniform} electric field $\vec E$, while $T_{\mu\nu}^{plasma}$ becomes a periodic function with period $\Delta x=2\pi T/E$ in the direction parallel to $\vec E$. A related periodicity is found for a uniform static magnetic field if one spatial direction perpendicular to the magnetic field is compactified to a circle.