General Theory of Free Particle Scattering

Huai‐Yu Wang

Abstract In quantum mechanics textbooks, a single-particle scattering theory is introduced. In the present work, a generalized scattering theory is presented, which can be in principle applied to the scattering problems of arbitrary number of particle. In laboratory frame, a generalized Lippmann-Schwinger scattering equation is derived. We emphasized that the derivation is rigorous, even for treating infinitesimals. No manual operation such as analytical continuation is allowed. In the case that before scattering N particles are plane waves and after the scattering they are new plane waves, the transition amplitude and transition probability are given and the generalized S matrix is presented. It is proved that the transition probability from a set of plane waves to a new set of plane waves of the N particles equal to that of the reciprocal process. The generalized theory is applied to the cases of one- and two-particle scattering as two examples. When applied to single-particle scattering problems, our generalized formalism degrades to that usually seen in the literature. When our generalized theory is applied to two-particle scattering problems, the formula of the transition probability of two-particle collision is given. It is shown that the transition probability of the scattering of two free particles is identical to that of the reciprocal process. This transition probability and the identity are needed in deriving Boltzmann transport equation in statistical mechanics. The case of identical particles is also discussed.

Ajoy Kumar Ghatak, S. Lokanathan

Stefano Longhi, Giuseppe Della Valle

Scattering of a quantum particle from an oscillating barrier or well does not generally conserve the particle energy owing to energy exchange with the photon field, and an incoming particle-free state is scattered into a set of outgoing (transmitted and reflected) free states according to Floquet scattering theory. Here we introduce two families of oscillating non-Hermitian potential wells in which Floquet scattering is fully suppressed for any energy of the incident particle. The scattering-free oscillating potentials are synthesized by application of the Darboux transformation to the time-dependent Schr\"odinger equation. For one of the two families of scattering-free potentials, the oscillating potential turns out to be fully invisible.

Franz S. Rys

A.S. Davydov