Applied Bohmian Mechanics From Nanoscale Systems to Cosmology Introduction

J. I. Cirac

Albert Benseny, Guillermo Albareda, Ángel S. Sanz +2 more

Craig Callender, Robert Weingard

Xavier Oriols, J. Mompart

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explains the historical development of Bohmian mechanics, Bohmian mechanics for single particle and for many particle systems. It discusses the dynamics of a single hydrogen atom interacting with a strong laser and presents a clear example on how a Bohmianthinking on superluminal velocities and nonlocal interactions helps in extending the quantum theory towards relativity and quantum field theory. The book also explains model nanoscale electron devices and their Bohmiancomputing development for knowing the ab initio quantum mechanical structure, energetics and thermodynamics of multiatoms systems. It deals with new cosmological models describing the accelerating universe in the spatially flat case. The book describes how many conceptual problems that appear in a description of gravity in quantum mechanical terms, such as the measurement problem and the problem of time, can be overcome by adopting a Bohmian perspective.

Paweł Klimasara, Jerzy Kral, Krzysztof Bielas +1 more

James B. Hartle

The predictions of the Bohmian and the decoherent (or consistent) histories formulations of the quantum mechanics of a closed system are compared for histories---sequences of alternatives at a series of times. For certain kinds of histories, Bohmian mechanics and decoherent histories may both be formulated in the same mathematical framework within which they can be compared. In that framework, Bohmian mechanics and decoherent histories represent a given history by different operators. Their predictions for the probabilities of histories of a closed system therefore generally differ. However, in an idealized model of measurement, the predictions of Bohmian mechanics and decoherent histories coincide for the probabilities of records of measurement outcomes. The formulations are thus difficult to distinguish experimentally. They may differ in their accounts of the past history of the Universe in quantum cosmology.