Year: 2016
Type: article
Abstract: We study a system of a finite size charged particle interacting with a radiation field by exploiting Hamilton’s principle for a non-conservative system recently introduced by Galley [1]. This formulation leads to the equation of motion of the charged particle that turns out to be the same as that obtained by Jackson [2]. We show that the radiation reaction stems from the non-conservative part of the effective action for a charged particle. We notice that a charge interacting with a radiation field modeled as a heat bath affords a way to justify that the radiation reaction is a non-conservative force. The topic is suitable for graduate courses on advanced electrodynamics and classical theory of fields.
Source: European Journal of Physics
Authors: Sandeep Aashish, Asrarul Haque
Language: English
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2233533022