Abstract Traditionally, the zitterbewegung (ZB) of the Dirac electron has just been studied at the level of quantum mechanics. Seeing the fact that an old interest in ZB has recently been rekindled by the investigations on spintronic, graphene, and superconducting systems, etc., this paper presents a quantum-field-theory investigation on ZB and obtains the conclusion that, the ZB of an electron arises from the influence of virtual electron--positron pairs (or vacuum fluctuations) on the electron.
Received: 08 March 2008
Revised: 30 March 2008
Accepted manuscript online:
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