Quantum Mechanics
Formalism, Methodologies, and Applications

A text on quantum mechanics for graduate students and researchers with explanations of fundamental principles and modern applications.

P. C. Deshmukh (Author)

9781316512258, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 4 January 2024

660 pages
24.8 x 19.2 x 3.6 cm, 1.18 kg

'This textbook on Quantum Mechanics (QM) follows a well-received CUP edition of the 'Foundations of Classical Mechanics' by the same author. While numerous texts on QM exist, the present book brings a fresh perspective given by a practicing atomic physics theorist with a wide range of research interests. The book is built from the historical background of QM up to the most recent applications including quantum information and computation. In this historical journey, the key milestones of QM are marked including the hydrogen atom, Feynman path integrals, light-matter interaction and scattering of atomic particles. A loving attention to detail and meticulous derivations make this book a pleasant and useful reading which will benefit both the students and practicing researchers.' Anatoli Kheifets, Research School of Physics, The Australian National University

Quantum Mechanics will enthuse graduate students and researchers and equip them with effective methodologies for challenging applications in atomic, molecular, and optical sciences and in condensed matter and nuclear physics also. This book attempts to make fundamental principles intuitively appealing. It will assist readers in learning difficult methods. Exposition of fundamental principles includes a discussion on position-momentum and energy-time uncertainty, angular momentum algebra, parity, bound and unbound eigenstates of an atom, approximation methods, time-reversal symmetry in collisions, and on a measurable time delay in scattering. It also provides an early introduction to Feynman path integrals and to geometric phase. A novel Lambert-W method to solve quantum mechanical problems is also introduced. It seeks to enable readers gain confidence in applying methods of non-relativistic and relativistic quantum theory rigorously to problems on atomic structure and dynamics, spectroscopy and quantum collisions, and problems on introductory quantum information processing and computing.

List of Figures
Foreword by Eva Lindroth
Preface
Chapter 1. Description of a physical system
Chapter 2. Feynman's formulation of quantum mechanics
Chapter 3. Continuum and bound eigenstates of one-dimensional potentials
Chapter 4. Angular momentum
Chapter 5. The nonrelativistic hydrogen atom
Chapter 6. Approximation methods
Chapter 7. The relativistic hydrogen atom
Chapter 8. Quantum mechanics of spectral transitions
Chapter 9. The many-electron atom
Chapter 10. Quantum collisions
Chapter 11. Introduction to entanglement and quantum computing
Appendix A. Role of symmetry in atomic physics
Appendix B. Schrödinger, Heisenberg and Dirac 'pictures' of quantum dynamics
Appendix C. Spherical harmonics
Appendix D. Occupation number formalism: second quantization
Appendix E. Electron structure studies with qubits
Index.

Subject Areas: Atomic & molecular physics [PHM]