Uniform analytic approximation of Wigner rotation matrices

We derive the leading asymptotic approximation, for low angle {\theta}, of the Wigner rotation matrix elements $d^j_{m_1m_2}(\theta)$, uniform in $j,m_1$ and $m_2$. The result is in terms of a Bessel function of integer order. We numerically investigate the error for a variety of cases and find that the approximation can be useful over a significant range of angles. This approximation has application in the partial wave analysis of wavepacket scattering.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure

Prediction of deviations from the Rutherford formula for low-energy Coulomb scattering of wavepackets

We calculate the nonrelativistic scattering of a wavepacket from a Coulomb potential and find deviations from the Rutherford formula in all cases. These generally occur only at low scattering angles, where they would be obscured by the part of the incident beam that emerges essentially unscattered. For a model experiment, the scattering of helium nuclei from a thin gold foil, we find the deviation region is magnified for low incident energies (in the keV range), so that a large shadow zone of low probability around the forward direction is expected to be measurable. From a theoretical perspective, the use of wavepackets makes partial wave analysis applicable to this infinite-range potential. It allows us to calculate the everywhere finite probability for a wavepacket to wavepacket transition and to relate this to the differential cross section. Time delays and advancements in the detection probabilities can be calculated. We investigate the optical theorem as applied to this special case.Comment: 21 pages, 8 figures. This version contains clarifications and additional results compared to the previous version. The paper has been accepted for publication in J.Phys.

Hybrid phase-space simulation method for interacting Bose fields

We introduce an approximate phase-space technique to simulate the quantum dynamics of interacting bosons. With the future goal of treating Bose-Einstein condensate systems, the method is designed for systems with a natural separation into highly occupied (condensed) modes and lightly occupied modes. The method self-consistently uses the Wigner representation to treat highly occupied modes and the positive-P representation for lightly occupied modes. In this method, truncation of higher-derivative terms from the Fokker-Planck equation is usually necessary. However, at least in the cases investigated here, the resulting systematic error, over a finite time, vanishes in the limit of large Wigner occupation numbers. We tested the method on a system of two interacting anharmonic oscillators, with high and low occupations, respectively. The Hybrid method successfully predicted atomic quadratures to a useful simulation time 60 times longer than that of the positive-P method. The truncated Wigner method also performed well in this test. For the prediction of the correlation in a quantum nondemolition measurement scheme, for this same system, the Hybrid method gave excellent agreement with the exact result, while the truncated Wigner method showed a large systematic error.Comment: 13 pages; 6 figures; references added; figures correcte

Ladder operators and coherent states for multi-step supersymmetric rational extensions of the truncated oscillator

We construct ladder operators, $\tilde{C}$ and $\tilde{C^\dagger}$, for a multi-step rational extension of the harmonic oscillator on the half plane, $x\ge0$. These ladder operators connect all states of the spectrum in only infinite-dimensional representations of their polynomial Heisenberg algebra. For comparison, we also construct two different classes of ladder operator acting on this system that form finite-dimensional as well as infinite-dimensional representations of their respective polynomial Heisenberg algebras. For the rational extension, we construct the position wavefunctions in terms of exceptional orthogonal polynomials. For a particular choice of parameters, we construct the coherent states, eigenvectors of $\tilde{C}$ with generally complex eigenvalues, $z$, as superpositions of a subset of the energy eigenvectors. Then we calculate the properties of these coherent states, looking for classical or non-classical behaviour. We calculate the energy expectation as a function of $|z|$. We plot position probability densities for the coherent states and for the even and odd cat states formed from these coherent states. We plot the Wigner function for a particular choice of $z$. For these coherent states on one arm of a beamsplitter, we calculate the two excitation number distribution and the linear entropy of the output state. We plot the standard deviations in $x$ and $p$ and find no squeezing in the regime considered. By plotting the Mandel $Q$ parameter for the coherent states as a function of $|z|$, we find that the number statistics is sub-Poissonian.Comment: 16 pages, 11 figure