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Huygens' principle, the free Schrodinger particle and the quantum anti-centrifugal force

M. A. Cirone, Joachim Dahl, Mikhail Vladimirovich Fedorov, Daniel M. Greenberger, Wolfgang P. Schleich

Published Aug 17, 2001• 12 citations
OpenAlex

Abstract

Huygens' principle following from the d'Alembert wave equation is not valid in two-dimensional space. A Schrodinger particle of vanishing angular momentum moving freely in two dimensions experiences an attractive force - the quantum anti-centrifugal force - towards its center. We connect these two phenomena by comparing and contrasting the radial propagators of the d'Alembert wave equation and of a free non-relativistic quantum mechanical particle in two and three dimensions.

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Huygens' principle following from the d'Alembert wave equation is not valid in two-dimensional space. A Schrodinger particle of vanishing angular momentum moving freely in two dimensions experiences an attractive force - the quantum anti-centrifugal force - towards its center. We connect these two phenomena by comparing and contrasting the radial propagators of the d'Alembert wave equation and of a free non-relativistic quantum mechanical particle in two and three dimensions.
We present Heisenberg's equation of motion for the radial variable of a free non-relativistic particle in D dimensions. The resulting radial force consists of three contributions: (i) the quantum fictitious force which is either attractive or repulsive depending on the number of dimensions, (ii) a singular quantum force located at the origin, and (iii) the centrifugal force associated with non-vanishing angular momentum. Moreover, we use Heisenberg's uncertainty relation to introduce a lower bound for the kinetic energy of an ensemble of neutral particles. This bound is quadratic in the number of atoms and can be traced back to the repulsive quantum fictitious potential. All three forces arise for a free particle: “Force without force”.
In a two-dimensional world, a free quantum particle of vanishing angular momentum experiences an attractive force. This force originates from a modification of the classical centrifugal force due to the wave nature of the particle. For positive energies the quantum anticentrifugal force manifests itself in a bunching of the nodes of the energy wave functions towards the origin. For negative energies this force is sufficient to create a bound state in a two-dimensional \ensuremath{\delta}-function potential. In a counterintuitive way, the attractive force pushes the particle away from the location of the \ensuremath{\delta}-function potential. As a consequence, the particle is localized in a band-shaped domain around the origin.
Abstract It is known that there is no room for anti-particles within the Schrödinger regime in quantum mechanics. In this article, we derive a (non-relativistic) Schrödinger-like wave equation for a spin- 1 / 2 1/21/21/2 free particle in 3 + 1 space-time dimensions, which includes both positive- and negative-energy eigenstates. We show that, under minimal interactions, this equation is invariant under 𝒫 𝒯 PT\mathcal{P}\mathcal{T}PT and 𝒞 discrete symmetries. An immediate consequence of this is that the particle exhibits Zitterbewegung (‘trembling motion’), which arises from the interference of positive- and negative-energy wave function components.