Geodesic deviation and particle creation in curved spacetimes

A quantum mechanical picture, relating accelerated geodesic deviation to creation of massive particles via quantum tunneling in curved background spacetimes, is presented. The effect is analogous to pair production by an electric field and leads naturally to production of massive particles in de Sitter and superluminal FRW spacetimes. The probability of particle production in de Sitter space per unit volume and time is computed in a leading semiclassical approximation and shown to coincide with the previously obtained expression.