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arXiv:1807.10099 · Physical Review A

Scattering due to geometry: Case of a spinless particle moving on an asymptotically flat embedded surface

Neslihan Oflaz, Ali Mostafazadeh, Mehrdad Ahmady

Published Aug 20, 2018• 8 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

A nonrelativistic quantum mechanical particle moving freely on a curved surface feels the effect of the nontrivial geometry of the surface through the kinetic part of the Hamiltonian, which is proportional to the Laplace-Beltrami operator, and a geometric potential, which is a linear combination of the mean and Gaussian curvatures of the surface. The coefficients of these terms cannot be uniquely determined by general principles of quantum mechanics but enter the calculation of various physical quantities. We examine their contribution to the geometric scattering of a scalar particle moving on an asymptotically flat embedded surface. In particular, having in mind the possibility of an experimental realization of the geometric scattering in a low-density electron gas formed on a bumped surface, we determine the scattering amplitude for arbitrary choices of the curvature coefficients for a surface with global or local cylindrical symmetry. We also examine the effect of perturbations that violate this symmetry and consider surfaces involving bumps that form a lattice.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.98.022126

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A nonrelativistic quantum mechanical particle moving freely on a curved surface feels the effect of the nontrivial geometry of the surface through the kinetic part of the Hamiltonian, which is proportional to the Laplace-Beltrami operator, and a geometric potential, which is a linear combination of the mean and Gaussian curvatures of the surface. The coefficients of these terms cannot be uniquely determined by general principles of quantum mechanics but enter the calculation of various physical quantities. We examine their contribution to the geometric scattering of a scalar particle moving on an asymptotically flat embedded surface. In particular, having in mind the possibility of an experimental realization of the geometric scattering in a low-density electron gas formed on a bumped surface, we determine the scattering amplitude for arbitrary choices of the curvature coefficients for a surface with global or local cylindrical symmetry. We also examine the effect of perturbations that violate this symmetry and consider surfaces involving bumps that form a lattice.
The scattering of free particles constrained to move on a cylindrically symmetric curved surface is studied. The nontrivial geometry of the space contributes to the scattering cross section through the kinetic as well as a possible scalar curvature term in the quantum Hamiltonian. The coefficient of the latter term is known to be related to the factor-ordering problem in curved-space quantization. Hence, in principle, the scattering data may be used to provide an experimental resolution of the theoretical factor-ordering ambiguity. To demonstrate the sensitivity required of such an experimental setup, the effect of a localized magnetic field in the scattering process is also analyzed. \textcopyright{} 1996 The American Physical Society.
Quantum mechanics is sensitive to the geometry of the underlying space. Here we present a framework for quantum scattering of a nonrelativistic particle confined to a two-dimensional space. When the motion manifold hosts localized curvature modulations, scattering occurs from an emergent geometric potential and the metric tensor field. Analytical and full numerical simulations identify the geometric potential as the primary source for low-energy scattering, while the metric tensor field of the curved space governs high-energy diffraction. Compared to flat spaces, important differences in the validity range of perturbation approaches are found and demonstrated by full numerical simulations using combined finite element and boundary element methods. As an illustration, we consider a Gaussian-shaped dent leading to effects known as gravitational lensing. Experimentally, the considered setup is realizable based on geometrically engineered two-dimensional materials.
We investigate how a localized curvature affects the dynamics of massless Dirac fermions in a curved surface. We consider a smooth bump with axial symmetry, adopting two specific geometric models, namely a Gaussian and a volcano-like bumps. By considering a minimal coupling between the spinor and the surface geometry, described by the vielbeins and the spin connection, we study the behavior of the wave function over the surface. By using appropriate numerical methods, we find a linear discrete energy spectrum for the Dirac fermions and its corresponding wavefunctions when the Fermi velocity is considered. It turns out that, since the curvature vanishes asymptotically, the electron states are free waves far from the bumps, but around the curved points, the wave function increases its probability density.
Nonrelativistic particles that are effectively confined to two dimensions can, in general, move on curved surfaces, allowing dynamical phenomena beyond what can be described with scalar potentials or even vector gauge fields. Here we consider a simple case of piecewise uniform curvature: a particle moves on a plane with a spherical extrusion. Depending on the latitude at which the sphere joins the plane, the extrusion can range from an infinitesimal bump to a nearly full sphere that just touches the plane. Free classical motion on this surface of piecewise uniform curvature follows geodesics that are independent of velocity, while quantum mechanical scattering depends on energy. We compare classical, semiclassical, and fully quantum problems, which are all exactly solvable, and show how semiclassical analysis explains the complex quantum differential cross section in terms of interference between two classical trajectories: the sphere on a plane acts as a kind of double slit.
Abstract A fundamental problem regarding the Dirac quantization of a free particle on an ( ) curved hypersurface embedded in N flat space is the impossibility to give the same form of the curvature‐induced quantum potential, the geometric potential as commonly called, as that given by the Schrödinger equation method where the particle moves in a region confined by a thin‐layer sandwiching the surface. This problem is resolved by means of a previously proposed scheme that hypothesizes a simultaneous quantization of positions, momenta, and Hamiltonian, among which the operator‐ordering‐free section is identified and is then found sufficient to lead to the expected form of geometric potential.
As a manifold is embedded into a higher dimensional Euclidean space, quantum mechanics gives various embedding quantities. In the present study, two embedding quantities for a two-dimensional curved surface in the three-dimensional flat space, the geometric momentum and the geometric potential, are derived in a unified manner. For a particle moving on a two-dimensional sphere or a free rotation of a spherical top, the projections of both the geometric momentum p\mathbf{p}p and the angular momentum L\mathbf{L}L onto a certain Cartesian axis form a complete set of commuting observables as [pi,Li]=0[p_{i},L_{i}]=0[pi​,Li​]=0 (i=1,2,3i=1,2,3i=1,2,3), thus constituting a dynamical (pi,Li)(p_{i},L_{i})(pi​,Li​) representation for the states on the two-dimensional spherical surface. The geometric momentum distribution of the states represented by spherical harmonics is successfully obtained, and this distribution for a homonuclear diatomic molecule seems within the resolution power of present momentum spectrometers and can be measured to probe the embedding effect.