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Journal of Physics A Mathematical and General

Potential scattering of Dirac particles

Bernd Thaller

Published Nov 1, 1981• 12 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Considers the Dirac equation with external electromagnetic fields and gives a careful formulation of the Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation. This electron-positron theory may be applied whenever electron and positron states can be separated, which is possible for a wide class of time-independent potentials vanishing at infinity. One then may introduce a system of observables with a position operator X(t) which is free of Zitterbewegung and yields the usual relativistic connection between momentum and velocity. The Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation is usually associated with a scattering theory (propagator formalism), which differs from the one of a one-particle interpretation (formalism imitating non-relativistic techniques). For the above-mentioned potentials there is a simple relationship between these physically different formalisms. There are, however, more general potentials for which the Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation may still be applied asymptotically. With the help of Klein's paradox the authors show that the Dirac equation may then have unphysical solutions not conserving the total charge.

DOI
10.1088/0305-4470/14/11/028

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Considers the Dirac equation with external electromagnetic fields and gives a careful formulation of the Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation. This electron-positron theory may be applied whenever electron and positron states can be separated, which is possible for a wide class of time-independent potentials vanishing at infinity. One then may introduce a system of observables with a position operator X(t) which is free of Zitterbewegung and yields the usual relativistic connection between momentum and velocity. The Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation is usually associated with a scattering theory (propagator formalism), which differs from the one of a one-particle interpretation (formalism imitating non-relativistic techniques). For the above-mentioned potentials there is a simple relationship between these physically different formalisms. There are, however, more general potentials for which the Stuckelberg-Feynman interpretation may still be applied asymptotically. With the help of Klein's paradox the authors show that the Dirac equation may then have unphysical solutions not conserving the total charge.
The paper analyzes time propagation of Dirac observables - using Heisenberg representation - in the light of various pseudodifferential operator algebras (cf. [Co3], [Co15], [Co16]). Our theory gives (i) a mechanical angular momentum (the spin), but also (ii) another real 3-vector, travelling with the particle, with magnetic properties (its motion guided by the magnetic field around it, but not in the proper relativistic way). The above is discussed for potentials vanishing at infinity. But we also look at a Dirac particle in the field of a plane polarized X-ray wave, trying to analyze the Compton effect. The propagations of energy and momentum (in the X-ray's direction) are coupled - they allow a joint asymptotic expansion with terms representing change of energy by nhνnhνnhν and momentum by nhν/cnhν/cnhν/c, with n=0,1,2, ..., valid for large frequencies, i.e., large momentum coordinates. Possible interpretation: A collision of the electron-positron with 0, 1, 2, ... n Photons of energy hνhνhν, affecting a change of energy-momentum. Note, this does not require QFT.
Dirac sought a relativistic quantum free-particle Hamiltonian that imposes space-time symmetry on the Schroedinger equation in configuration representation; he ignored the Lorentz covariance of energy-momentum. Dirac free-particle velocity therefore is momentum-independent, breaching relativity basics. Dirac also made solutions of his equation satisfy the Klein-Gordon equation via requirements imposed on its operators. Dirac particle speed is thereby fixed to the unphysical value of c times the square root of three, and anticommutation requirements prevent four observables, including the components of velocity, from commuting when Planck's constant vanishes, a correspondence-principle breach responsible for Dirac free-particle spontaneous acceleration (zitterbewegung) that diverges in the classical limit. Nonrelativistic Pauli theory contrariwise is physically sensible, and its particle rest-frame action can be extended to become Lorentz invariant. The consequent Lagrangian yields the corresponding closed-form relativistic Hamiltonian when magnetic field is absent, otherwise a successive-approximation regime applies.
This paper examines the Foldy-Wouthuysen and Feynman-Gell-Mann representations of the Dirac equation. The analysis is conducted for electrons and positrons interacting with electromagnetic fields. Versions of quantum electrodynamics are considered both within the scope of perturbation theory and in the nonperturbative case with strong electromagnetic fields. Mathematical artifacts that contradicting the physical premises of the theory are identified in the studied representations of the Dirac equation. These mathematical paradoxes are resolved if the theory only employs amplitude states (real and virtual) with positive energies.
A novel interpretation is given of Dirac's "wave equation for the relativistic electron" as a quantum-mechanical one-particle equation. In this interpretation the electron and the positron are merely the two different "topological spin" states of a single more fundamental particle, not distinct particles in their own right. The new interpretation is backed up by the existence of such bi-particle structures in general relativity, in particular the ring singularity present in any spacelike section of the maximal analytically extended, topologically non-trivial, electromagnetic Kerr-Newman spacetime in the zero-gravity limit (here, "zero-gravity" means the limit G→0G\to 0G→0, where GGG is Newton's constant of universal gravitation). This novel interpretation resolves the dilemma that Dirac's wave equation seems to be capable of describing both the electron and the positron in "external" fields in many relevant situations, while the bi-spinorial wave function has only a single position variable in its argument, not two - as it should if it were a two-particle equation! A Dirac equation is formulated for a ring-like bi-particle which interacts with a static point charges located elsewhere in the topologically non-trivial physical space associated with the moving ring bi-particle, the motion being governed by a de-Broglie-Bohm type law extracted from the Dirac equation. As an application, the pertinent general-relativistic zero-gravity Hydrogen problem is studied in the usual Born-Oppenheimer approximation. Its spectral results suggest that the zero-GGG Kerr-Newman magnetic moment be identified with the so-called "anomalous magnetic moment of the physical electron," not with the Bohr magneton, so that the ring radius is only a tiny fraction of the electron's Compton wave length.
In this paper, it is presented a historical account of the formulation of the quantum relativistic wave equation of an electron – the Dirac equation, issues regarding its interpretation that arose from the very beginning, and the later formulation of this equation in relation to a quantized electron-positron field, which implies a new interpretation. The way in which solutions obtained under each interpretation of the equation relate to one another is also considered for the simple case of hydrogen-like problems.