On the Schott Term in the Lorentz-Abraham-Dirac Equation

Abstract

The equation of motion for a radiating charged particle is known as the Lorentz–Abraham–Dirac (LAD) equation. The radiation reaction force in the LAD equation contains a third time-derivative term, called the Schott term, which leads to a runaway solution and a pre-acceleration solution. Since the Schott energy is the field energy confined to an area close to the particle and reversibly exchanged between particle and fields, the question of how it affects particle motion is of interest. In here we have obtained solutions for the LAD equation with and without the Schott term, and have compared them quantitatively. We have shown that the relative difference between the two solutions is quite small in the classical radiation reaction dominated regime.