The authors consider a system of identical particles distributed in two clusters and described by harmonic oscillator wavefunctions. A set of non-spurious two-cluster states, whose centre-of-mass is at rest, is constructed. It is characterized by the cluster Yamanouchi symbols as well as by its overall permutational symmetry, angular momentum and total energy. Applications to nuclear cluster models, to the evaluation of nuclear spectroscopic factors, to the description of nuclei as quark-clusters, and to the study of interacting rare-gas clusters are pointed out.
An explicit construction is found for a unitary operator which insures the free motion of the center of mass of any many-particle wave function on which it is allowed to act. The transformation is used to calculate recoil correction terms for the internal energy and external interactions of nuclei, and some numerical evaluations are given for cases of interest. The many-body harmonic-oscillator problem is exactly soluble when one uses the transformation, and one is thus enabled to give a more general discussion of the spurious states.
The quantum model of a cluster, consisting of A identical particles, coupled by the internal pair interactions and affected by the external field of a target, is considered. A symbolic-numerical algorithm for generating A-1-dimensional oscillator eigenfunctions, symmetric or antisymmetric with respect to permutations of A identical particles in the new symmetrized coordinates, is formulated and implemented using the MAPLE computer algebra system. Examples of generating the symmetrized coordinate representation for A-1 dimensional oscillator functions in one-dimensional Euclidean space are analyzed. The approach is aimed at solving the problem of tunnelling the clusters, consisting of several identical particles, through repulsive potential barriers of a target.
We study the quantum mechanical harmonic oscillator in two and three dimensions, with particular attention to the solutions as basis states for representing their respective symmetry groups — O(2), O(1,1), O(3), and O(2,1). The goal of this study is to establish a correspondence between Hilbert space descriptions found by solving the Schrodinger equation in polar coordinates, and Fock space descriptions constructed by expressing the symmetry operators in terms of creation/annihilation operators. We obtain wavefunctions characterized by a principal quantum number, the group Casimir eigenvalue, and one group generator whose eigenvalue is m + s , for integer m and real constant parameter s . For the three groups that contain O(2), the solutions split into two inequivalent representations, one associated with s = 0, from which we recover the familiar description of the oscillator as a product of one-dimensional solutions, and the other with s > 0 (in three dimensions, solutions are found for s = 0 and s = 1/2) whose solutions are non-separable in Cartesian coordinates, and are hence overlooked by the standard Fock space approach. The O(1,1) solutions are singlet states, restricted to zero eigenvalue of the symmetry operator, which represents the boost, not angular momentum. For O(2), a single set of creation and annihilation operators forms a ladder representation for the allowed oscillator states for any s, and the degeneracy of energy states is always finite. However, in three dimensions, the integer and half-integer eigenstates are qualitatively different: the former can be expressed as finite dimensional irreducible tensors under O(3) or O(2,1) while the latter exhibit infinite degeneracy. Creation operators that produce the allowed integer states by acting on the non-degenerate ground state are constructed as irreducible tensor products of the fundamental vector representation. However, the half-integer eigenstates are infinite-dimensional, as expected for the non-compact O(2,1), and no Fock space description is found for this case. For all s ≠ 0 solutions, the SU(N) symmetry of the harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian recently discovered by Bars is spontaneously broken by the ground state. The connection of this symmetry breaking to the non-separability into one-dimensional Cartesian solutions is demonstrated. We conclude with a discussion of the O(2,1) solutions, and the problem of timelike ghost excitations.
A field theoretical formulation of the rather easy problem of N identical, one-dimensional bosons, interacting pairwise via harmonic oscillator potentials of equal force constants is given, in a way similar to the way the nonlinear Schrodinger model provides a field theoretical formulation of a one-dimensional, delta -function Bose gas. The nonlinear integro-differential equation obtained for the complex scalar field of the model is treated classically, and solved in the semiclassical limit of a large number of particles. Working in the centre of mass frame of the field, a sequence of operators that would raise or lower the energy of a state by definite amounts without changing its particle number are constructed from certain bilinear expressions in the field. These operators have, in the limit of a large number of particles, commutation relations similar to those of the Fourier modes of a compact free field, except that the first mode is missing as a result of the fact that the field in the centre of mass frame is subject to the obvious constraint that its centre of mass always coincides with the coordinate origin. The quantum states can be labelled by the total centre of mass momentum, and the quasi-particle numbers in each of the independent oscillator modes. The energy spectrum of the system is calculated, giving the same results as the exact, quantum-mechanical N-body analysis.
We study the quantum mechanical harmonic oscillator in two and three dimensions, with particular attention to the solutions as represents of their respective symmetry groups: O(2), O(3), and O(2,1). Solving the Schrodinger equation by separating variables in polar coordinates, we obtain wavefunctions characterized by a principal quantum number, the group Casimir eigenvalue, and one observable component of orbital angular momentum, with eigenvalue
m+s, for integer
m and real constant parameter
s. In each symmetry group,
s splits the solutions into two inequivalent representations, one associated with
s=0, which recovers the familiar description of the oscillator as a product of one-dimensional solutions, and the other with
s>0 (in three dimensions,
s=0,1/2) whose solutions are non-separable in Cartesian coordinates, and are hence overlooked by the standard Fock space approach. In two dimensions, a single set of creation and annihilation operators forms a ladder representation for the allowed oscillator states for any
s, and the degeneracy of energy states is always finite. However, in three dimensions, the integer and half-integer eigenstates are qualitatively different: the former can be expressed as finite dimensional irreducible tensors under O(3) or O(2,1), and a ladder representation can be constructed via irreducible tensor products of the vector creation operator multiplet, while the latter exhibit infinite degeneracy and the finite-dimensional ladder representation fails for these states. These results are closely connected to the breaking of a unitary symmetry of the harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian recently discussed by Bars.