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I had a couple of questions about virtual particles, as I am still learning. I know that virtual particles arise from quantum fluctuations in quantum fields. Here is what I am wondering:

  1. If a near-perfect vacuum was created in a closed system, would the entropy of the system be near zero? What about an isolated system?
  2. Do virtual particles appear more frequently near zero entropy? How would I go about calculating how many are created?
  3. Are virtual particles still affected by magnetic and electric fields?
  4. Can virtual particles release energy when they annihilate just like real matter-antimatter particles?
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    I, and many others, will suggest that you abandon virtual particles as a fundamental concept and (at least while you are learning) only consider them as a label for certain terms in a Feynman diagram. If you search for virtual particle questions you can find lots of discussion of this.

    The question of entropy in a quantum field theory is still a good one, though, and turns out to be rather tricky. See, for example, https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/614575/why-is-entanglement-entropy-in-qft-infinite

    – Rococo Jan 23 '22 at 18:20
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    Ok, thank you for clarification. – QwertyFailMan Jan 26 '22 at 20:42

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