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Lecture 12

This document summarizes the key concepts of time-independent perturbation theory. It introduces the general formalism where the unperturbed Hamiltonian and its solutions are known, and the problem is to find the perturbed solutions. The perturbed wavefunction and energy are expanded as power series in the perturbation potential. Separating the perturbation equation into orders gives equations that can be solved order-by-order to find corrections to the energy and wavefunction. First-order perturbation theory is derived, giving a formula for the first-order energy correction. Examples are provided and the derivation of the first-order corrected wavefunction and second-order energy correction are outlined.

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Aishah Darwisya
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238 views8 pages

Lecture 12

This document summarizes the key concepts of time-independent perturbation theory. It introduces the general formalism where the unperturbed Hamiltonian and its solutions are known, and the problem is to find the perturbed solutions. The perturbed wavefunction and energy are expanded as power series in the perturbation potential. Separating the perturbation equation into orders gives equations that can be solved order-by-order to find corrections to the energy and wavefunction. First-order perturbation theory is derived, giving a formula for the first-order energy correction. Examples are provided and the derivation of the first-order corrected wavefunction and second-order energy correction are outlined.

Uploaded by

Aishah Darwisya
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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L12.

P1

Lecture 12: Time-independent perturbation theory


Nondegenerate perturbation theory General formalism of the problem: Suppose that we solved the time-independent Schrdinger equation for some potential and obtained a complete set of orthonormal eigenfunctions and corresponding eigenvalues . This is the problem that we completely understand and know solutions for.

We mark all these solutions and the Hamiltonian with " " label. Now we slightly perturb the potential. For example, we raise a little bit the bottom of the infinite square well or put a little bump there:

The problem of the perturbation theory is to find eigenvalues and eigenfunctions of the perturbed potential, i.e. to solve approximately the following equation:

using the known solutions of the problem

For now, we consider nondegenerate case, i.e. each eigenvalue corresponds to different eigenfunction.

Lecture 12 Page 1

L12.P1

We expand our solution as follows in terms of perturbation H'

We plug our expansions into

Lecture 12 Page 2

L12.P3 We now separate this equation into a system of equations that are zeroth, first, second, and so on orders in perturbation potential H' (class exercise):

Separating the equations for zeroth, first, and second orders we get: Zeroth order First order

Second order

If we consider more terms in the expansions for fourth, and higher orders of perturbation theory.

and

we can write equations for third,

Lecture 12 Page 3

L12.P4 First-order perturbation theory

We are going to multiply this equation by

and integrate:

Therefore, the first-order energy is given by:

Lecture 12 Page 4

L12.P5 Problem #1 (class exercise) The solutions for the infinite square well are:

Find the first-order correction to the energies for the potential

Solution:

Corrected energy levels are

Problem #2 (class exercise) The same for the potential

Lecture 12 Page 5

First-order correction to the wave function

can be expanded as a linear combination of functions constitute a complete set.

since they

Our mission now is to find coefficients order equation (1).

. To do so, we plug our expansion (2) into the first-

We multiply this equation from the left side by and integrate. I will not explicitly write integrals here, but use inner product notations right away. It is, of course, the same.

Lecture 12 Page 6

L12.P6

First-order correction to the wave function is given by

Note that as long as m n, the denominator can not be zero as long as energy levels are nondegenerate. If the energy levels are degenerate, we need degenerate perturbation theory ( consider later).

Lecture 12 Page 7

L12.P7 Second-order correction to the energy (class exercise)

Again, we multiply the whole equation from the left by

and integrate.

The second-order correction to the energy is

Lecture 12 Page 8

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