Integral transforms of the quantum mechanical path integral: hit function and path averaged potential

Abstract

We introduce two new integral transforms of the quantum mechanical transition kernel that represent physical information about the path integral. These transforms can be interpreted as probability distributions on particle trajectories measuring respectively the relative contribution to the path integral from paths crossing a given spatial point (the hit function) and the likelihood of values of the line integral of the potential along a path in the ensemble (the path averaged potential).Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, 2 appendices. Updated to published versio