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arXiv:1809.04416

Path integral and Sommerfeld quantization

Mikoto Matsuda, Takehisa Fujita

Published Aug 18, 2018• 0 citations
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Abstract

The path integral formulation can reproduce the right energy spectrum of the harmonic oscillator potential, but it cannot resolve the Coulomb potential problem. This is because the path integral cannot properly take into account the boundary condition, which is due to the presence of the scattering states in the Coulomb potential system. On the other hand, the Sommerfeld quantization can reproduce the right energy spectrum of both harmonic oscillator and Coulomb potential cases since the boundary condition is effectively taken into account in this semiclassical treatment. The basic difference between the two schemes should be that no constraint is imposed on the wave function in the path integral while the Sommerfeld quantization rule is derived by requiring that the state vector should be a single-valued function. The limitation of the semiclassical method is also clarified in terms of the square well and $δ(x)$ function potential models.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1809.04416

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The path integral formulation can reproduce the right energy spectrum of the harmonic oscillator potential, but it cannot resolve the Coulomb potential problem. This is because the path integral cannot properly take into account the boundary condition, which is due to the presence of the scattering states in the Coulomb potential system. On the other hand, the Sommerfeld quantization can reproduce the right energy spectrum of both harmonic oscillator and Coulomb potential cases since the boundary condition is effectively taken into account in this semiclassical treatment. The basic difference between the two schemes should be that no constraint is imposed on the wave function in the path integral while the Sommerfeld quantization rule is derived by requiring that the state vector should be a single-valued function. The limitation of the semiclassical method is also clarified in terms of the square well and δ(x)δ(x)δ(x) function potential models.
With the use of the Weyl correspondence between quantum mechanical operators and classical dynamical functions, an exact quantization rule is derived for a system with one degree of freedom and arbitrary Hamiltonian. In the semiclassical limit of small Planck's constant, this reduces to the Bohr-Sommerfeld quantization rule as derived by the WKB approximation. Higher order terms are also derived. It is further proven that for a simple harmonic oscillator the Bohr-Sommerfeld rule must give the exact energy eigenvalues for all states.
In the present investigation we assess the relevance of both classically forbidden phenomena and higher-order asymptotic contributions for the semiclassical energy quantization of a particle in the anharmonic oscillator potential V(x)=x 2 /2+ lambda x 4 . We propose an iterative method (Iq) for obtaining higher-order semiclassical corrections, which is similar to the WKB and phase-integral methods in the lowest order, but in higher orders the approximation differs significantly. A 'primitive' Bohr-Sommerfeld energy quantization is compared with a more complete semiclassical quantization, taking into account both complex trajectory contributions and higher-order (quantal) corrections.
We revisit the analysis of sharp infinite potentials within the path integral formalism using the image method [1]. We show that the use of a complete set of energy eigenstates that satisfy the boundary conditions of an infinite wall precisely generates the propagator proposed in Ref. [1]. We then show the validity of the image method by using supersymmetric quantum mechanics to relate a potential without a sharp boundary to the infinite square well and derive its propagator with an infinite number of image charges. Finally, we show that the image method readily generates the propagator for the half-harmonic oscillator, a potential that has a sharp infinite boundary at the origin and a quadratic potential in the allowed region, and leads to the well known eigenvalues and eigenfunctions.
Bohr's atomic theory is widely viewed as remarkable, both for its accuracy in predicting the observed optical transitions of one-electron atoms and for its failure to fully correspond with current electronic structure theory. What is not generally appreciated is that Bohr's original semiclassical conception differed significantly from the Bohr-Sommerfeld theory and offers an alternative semiclassical approximation scheme with remarkable attributes. More specifically, Bohr's original method did not impose action quantization constraints but rather obtained these as predictions by simply matching photon and classical orbital frequencies. In other words, the hydrogen atom was treated entirely classically and orbital quantized emerged directly from the Planck-Einstein photon quantization condition, E = h nu. Here, we revisit this early history of quantum theory and demonstrate the application of Bohr's original strategy to the three quintessential quantum systems: an electron in a box, an electron in a ring, and a dipolar harmonic oscillator. The usual energy-level spectra, and optical selection rules, emerge by solving an algebraic (quadratic) equation, rather than a Bohr-Sommerfeld integral (or Schroedinger) equation. However, the new predictions include a frozen (zero-kinetic-energy) state which in some (but not all) cases lies below the usual zero-point energy. In addition to raising provocative questions concerning the origin of quantum-chemical phenomena, the results may prove to be of pedagogical value in introducing students to quantum mechanics.
Two methods for obtaining the ladder spectrum characteristic of the simple harmonic oscillator are widely used in elementary quantum mechanics. In the first method, that of series solution, quantization is shown to follow from the requirement that the wave function be normalizable. In the second, it is common to derive quantisation in an operator formalism based on factorization of the wave equation. In this latter method the role of normalizability is not customarily discussed. We show explicitly that the same boundary condition implicit in the operator manipulations leads to quantization in both methods.