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Progress of Theoretical Physics

An Operator Formalism to the Path Integral Method

Taku Goto, S. Naka

Published Oct 1, 1976• 3 citations
Publisher

Abstract

An operator formalism to the path integral method is developed. In this formalism the operator characterizing the trajectories of the particle is introduced and the usual path integral is expressed in terms of expectation value of a functional of that operator. We also investigate the Wiener-Hermite expansion on the basis of our operator formalism. Feynman's path integral is justified as a sort of analytic continuation of the path integral in the Wiener process.

DOI
10.1143/ptp.56.1318

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An operator formalism to the path integral method is developed. In this formalism the operator characterizing the trajectories of the particle is introduced and the usual path integral is expressed in terms of expectation value of a functional of that operator. We also investigate the Wiener-Hermite expansion on the basis of our operator formalism. Feynman's path integral is justified as a sort of analytic continuation of the path integral in the Wiener process.
Abstract Feynman developed the path integral approach to quantum mechanics as an alternative to wave or matrix mechanics that has found fruitful implementation in quantum mechanics, quantum electrodynamics, and statistical physics. Despite its many successes, the usual Feynman path integral formalism suffers from a lack of mathematical rigor. Questions of mathematical rigor still exist, but Mark Kac provided a rigorous path integral approach to quantum mechanics. The Kac formulation for quantum systems is given in terms of Wiener measure for a path integral and employs the Brownian motion distribution. In this paper, we review the Feynman–Kac approach and other stochastic processes related to Brownian motion. We also give an account of the successes and difficulties we faced during our journey through numerical path integral problems involved in physics.
Introduction Preliminary remarks The path integral formalism is one of the most important tools in modern theoretical physics. Integration in functional spaces was considered for the first time by Norbert Wiener in his studies of diffusion processes [60, 61]. The corresponding integration measure is now known as the Wiener measure, i.e. the so-called Gaussian path integrals were studied. In quantum mechanics, functional integrals were introduced by R. Feynmann [62, 63] who was inspired by important observations due to P. A. M. Dirac concerning a relation between wave function and classical action [64, 65]. In modern physics the path integral formalism is applied not only to developing a quantum description for systems with infinitely many degrees of freedom as, for example, in quantum field theories or condensed matter physics, but also to ordinary quantum mechanical problems. Moreover there is a tendency to reformulate standard quantum mechanical problems (such as a particle in a “box” or potential well [66, 67], or a particle in the Coulomb field [68]) within the framework of the path integral method. The reason for doing this is rather obvious: physicists develop a new mathematical tool, a new language and, in order to comprehend all of its subtleties, it is necessary to investigate as many concrete examples as possible. Use of the path integral formalism is widespread in quantum field theory because it is the most adequate mathematical tool for a wide range of problems which allows, not only for elegant formulation of problems, but also for a great deal of simplification of their theoretical analysis.