What Is the Self-Energy of an Electron?

[burak_ilhan]

What is so called SELF ENERGY? I know the explanation that it is the energy that a point charge has when it is by itself,at a large distance from other charges. In textbook (ohanian) says that it takes work to assemble the point charge out of infinitesimal pieces of charge.The energy needed to assemble the point charge is called the self-energy of the point charge.I know that this explanation is clear enough.But as i know e=1.6*10^-19 C , the charge of electron or proton is the smallest charge, and all other charges are INTEGER*e.So I thought that I can assume that self energy of an electron is zero.But I learned that it turns out to be Infinite...

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Self Energy is a concept in quantum mechanics that describes the energy of a system due to its interaction with itself. It is a form of self-inductance and is especially important in understanding the behavior of electrons in atoms and molecules.

The self-energy of an electron was first introduced in 1923 by Arnold Sommerfeld to solve the problem of the anomalous Zeeman effect.