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Journal of Mathematical Physics

Properties of the Irreducible Angular Momentum Tensors

M. E. Rose

Published May 1, 1962• 23 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The angular momentum operators define a set of irreducible tensors which are unique except for a normalization constant. The normalization is conveniently defined in terms of statistical tensors which describe oriented states. The properties of the tensors discussed here include: (1) the trace of products of components of such tensors, (2) symmetry properties of the traces, and (3) the expansion of products of components of these tensors into a sum of irreducible tensors. The corresponding expansion of commutators and anticommutators of these components is also discussed briefly.

DOI
10.1063/1.1724241

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The angular momentum operators define a set of irreducible tensors which are unique except for a normalization constant. The normalization is conveniently defined in terms of statistical tensors which describe oriented states. The properties of the tensors discussed here include: (1) the trace of products of components of such tensors, (2) symmetry properties of the traces, and (3) the expansion of products of components of these tensors into a sum of irreducible tensors. The corresponding expansion of commutators and anticommutators of these components is also discussed briefly.
When a classical particle moves in a central field the energy and the three components of angular momentum are all constants of the motion. The motion is an orbit whose orientation in space is fixed. To discuss the corresponding situation in quantum mechanics we must examine the commutation properties of the associated operators: If they all commute, then the quantities which they represent may all simultaneously be constants of the motion; if not, we must find as many mutually commuting operators as we can and obtain a maximal set of constants of the motion.
This chapter shows that the three operators are Hermitian and (in a rotationally invariant system) commute with the Hamiltonian; therefore they are observable constants of the motion. It finds out what their physical significance is. By knowing from classical mechanics, the constant of the motion arising from rotational invariance is the angular momentum. The angular momentum may split up into two parts: orbital and intrinsic. The orbital part can always be described by the dependence of a wave function, whereas the intrinsic part is by definition contained in the transformation property of the wave function. In the case of a single component (scalar), no intrinsic angular momentum exists. There are—apart from the vector addition and the scalar product—two other ways of combining two vectors: the direct sum and the direct product. Both occur in the theory of angular momentum, in fact whenever symmetry is involved.
The angular momentum plays an important role in quantum mechanics. It is no longer an ordinary vector, instead it is a vector operator, whose three components do not commute with each other. In quantum mechanics, the angular momentum becomes a vector operator. A general angular momentum is defined as a vector operator whose components are Hermitian operators satisfying the commutation relations similar to those for the orbital angular momentum. In order to obtain the eigenvalues and eigenfunctions, it is more convenient to express the orbital angular momentum operators in spherical polar coordinates. Spin angular momentum is an intrinsic property of elementary particles. In quantum computing, a qubit or quantum bit is a quantum version of the classical binary bit physically realized in a two-state quantum-mechanical system.