Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: The vacuum persistence probability, encoded in the imaginary part of the in-out effective action, is a basic measure of vacuum instability and particle production. However, its evaluation may appear prescription-dependent: the Bogoliubov prescription and the Green's function prescription can yield different expressions. We show that this apparent ambiguity arises because the Green's function prescription omits the nontrivial contribution from the endpoint vacuum wavefunctionals, which should be present in the complete in-out amplitude. Including this contribution accomplishes the boundary completion of the Green's function prescription. The ambiguity is thereby resolved, and the complete result agrees with the Bogoliubov expression.
DOI: 10.1103/b332-8ryl
Authors: Yu Zhou, Hai-Qing Zhang
Language: English
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7170689102