In the solution of an exercise, the following reasoning is used:
1) ⟨ψ1ψ2|H1|ψ1ψ2⟩+⟨ψ1ψ2|H2|ψ1ψ2⟩=⟨ψ1|H1|ψ1⟩⟨ψ2|ψ2⟩+⟨ψ1|ψ1⟩⟨ψ2|H2|ψ2⟩
2) ⟨ψ1ψ2|H1|ψ2ψ1⟩+⟨ψ1ψ2|H2|ψ2ψ1⟩=⟨ψ1|H1|ψ2⟩⟨ψ2|ψ1⟩+⟨ψ1|ψ2⟩⟨ψ2|H2|ψ1⟩
H1 and H2 refer to the Hamiltonian operator.
May I ask you what property - and if possible the name of this property so that I can look it up on the internet - they used to go from the left hand side to the right hand side for both line 1) and 2)?
I was unable to find anything on the internet (maybe I used the wrong terms ?), even on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bra%E2%80%93ket_notation#Properties
Answer
What you've written from your text/exercise is an abuse of notation, but it is standard.
The composite state |ψα⟩ is the tensor product of the states |ψ⟩∈H1 and |α⟩∈H2, which is sometimes written |ψα⟩≡|ψ⟩⊗|α⟩. A very typical example of such a state is a spatial wavefunction attached to a spin-1/2 state, in which case H1=L2(R) and H2=C2.
The space that such composite states belong to is the tensor product of the Hilbert spaces H1 and H2, usually written H1⊗H2. The inner product on such a space can be inherited from the inner products on H1 and H2. Letting ψ,ϕ∈H1 and α,β∈H2, we have
⟨ψα|ϕβ⟩H1⊗H2=⟨ψ|ϕ⟩H1⋅⟨α|β⟩H2
Given two operators A and B which act on H1 and H2, we can define a new operator which acts on H1⊗H2 like this:
(A⊗B)(|ψ⟩⊗|α⟩)=(A|ψ⟩)⊗(B|α⟩)
Putting everything together (and dropping the subscripts on the inner products,
⟨ψα|(A⊗B)|ϕβ⟩=⟨ψ|A|ϕ⟩⋅⟨α|B|β⟩
With that out of the way, if you have a composite system made by stitching together the Hilbert spaces H1 and H2, then the Hamiltonian for the composite system is
H=H1⊗I2+I1⊗H2
where H1,2 are the Hamiltonian operators acting on H1 and H2, and I1,2 are the identity operators on H1 and H2. Plugging this in to what I wrote above provides you with the answer you're looking for.
More specifically, note that
⟨ψ1ψ2|H1⊗I|ψ2ψ1⟩=⟨ψ1|H1|ψ2⟩⋅⟨ψ2|I|ψ1⟩=⟨ψ1|H1|ψ2⟩⋅⟨ψ2|ψ1⟩
No comments:
Post a Comment