Quantum generalized Langevin equation approach to gas/solid collisions

✍ Scribed by S.A. Adelman

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1976
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 385 KB
• Volume: 40
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0009-2614
• DOI: 10.1016/0009-2614(76)85127-5

✦ Synopsis

The classical generalized Langevin equation (GLE) approach to gas/solid collisions is generalized to quantum ss.'.bring.

Using Feynman's method of partial path integration, the full gas/solid propagator is reduced to a form in which only the dynamics of the incident atom and the surface oscillator(s) directly struck appear explicitly. Solving this effective dynrmical problem in the semiclassical limit yields a stationary phase equation of motion identical in form to the classical GLE. The noise, however, is distributed according to quantum rather than classical statistics. From the GLE a quantum phase can be cor.structed and an S-matrix computed. The resulting theory is capable of describing inelasticdiffractive scattering which has been seen experimentally by Williams.

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