Classical and Quantum Radiation Reaction

Understand

This thesis reports on work undertaken in comparing the effects of the phenomenon of radiation reaction in classical and quantum theories of electrodynamics.

• Specifically, it is concerned with the prediction of the change in position of a particle due to the inclusion of the self-force in the theory.
• We calculate this position shift for the classical theory, treating radiation reaction as a perturbation in line with the reduction of order procedure.
• We calculate the contributions to the position shift in the $\hbar\to 0$ limit of quantum field theory to order $e^2$ in the coupling, the order of the classical self-force.