Variation principle for nonlinea Lagrangian in quantum mechanics (「非線型場」研究会報告)

礼司 菅野, 晃也 大谷

礼司 菅野, 晃也 大谷

Donald H. Kobe

Teruya Ohtani, Reiji Sugano

The variation principle has not been well defined in quantum mechanics for a Lagrangian containing a velocity dependent potential. We investigate the method of variation to derive an Euler-Lagrange equation in connection with Noether's theorem when the Lagrangian is invariant under some point transformation. Obtained are the Euler-Lagrange equation retaining the above invariance by means of the variation method and the Hamiltonian with which the canonical equation of motion leads to the Euler-Lagrange equation.

Lech S. Papiez

Jianhao M. Yang

Stochastic mechanics is regarded as a physical theory to explain quantum mechanics with classical terms such that some of the quantum mechanics paradoxes can be avoided. Here, we propose a new variational principle to uncover more insights on stochastic mechanics. According to this principle, information measures, such as relative entropy and Fisher information, are imposed as constraints on top of the least action principle. This principle not only recovers Nelson’s theory and, consequently, the Schrödinger equation but also clears an unresolved issue in stochastic mechanics on why multiple Lagrangians can be used in the variational method and yield the same theory. The concept of forward and backward paths provides an intuitive physical picture for stochastic mechanics. Each path configuration is considered as a degree of freedom and has its own law of dynamics. Thus, the variation principle proposed here can be a new tool to derive more advanced stochastic theory by including additional degrees of freedom in the theory. The structure of Lagrangian developed here shows that some terms in the Lagrangian are originated from information constraints. This suggests that a Lagrangian may need to include both physical and informational terms in order to have a complete description of the dynamics of a physical system.