Oblique photons, plasmons, and current-plasmons in relativistic plasmas and their topological implications

Abstract: Photons in vacuum are transverse in any inertial frame; longitudinal photons only exist virtually. By developing a manifestly covariant theory for electromagnetic excitations in relativistic plasmas and applying Wigner's little group method for elementary particle classifications, we show that photons in plasmas are neither transverse nor longitudinal; they are oblique. Plasmons are electromagnetic and oblique as well. The Lorentz invariant characteristics that distinguishes photons and plasmons is covariant compressibility. The manifestly covariant theory predicts the existence of the current-plasmon, a third oblique, electromagnetic eigenmode, and it also enables the study of photon topology in plasmas. Plasmas remove the photon's Dirac point in vacuum by giving it an effective mass, but create a tilted Dirac-Weyl point by reviving the virtual longitudinal photon. The manifest covariance of the theory demonstrates that relativistic transparency, despite being widely studied, does not exist in plasmas.