Quantum Noise in Amplifiers and Hawking/Dumb-Hole Radiation as Amplifier Noise

Abstract: The quantum noise in a linear amplifier is shown to be thermal noise. The theory of linear amplifiers is applied first to the simplest, single or double oscillator model of an amplifier, and then to linear model of an amplifier with continuous fields and input and outputs. Finally it is shown that the thermal noise emitted by black holes first demonstrated by Hawking, and of dumb holes (sonic and other analogs to black holes), arises from the same analysis as for linear amplifiers. The amplifier noise of black holes acting as amplifiers on the quantum fields living in the spacetime surrounding the black hole is the radiation discovered by Hawking. For any amplifier, that quantum noise is completely characterized by the attributes of the system regarded as a classical amplifier, and arises out of those classical amplification factors and the commutation relations of quantum mechanics.