English

On the symmetry of a one-dimensional hydrogen atom

Quantum Physics 2018-09-20 v2

Abstract

We touch upon a long-standing question of the "true" one-dimensional hydrogen atom solution. From a symmetry point of view, Kepler problem in d2d\ge2 dimension is characterized by geometrical rotational symmetry, SO(d)SO(d), as well as dynamical, "accidental" SO(d+1)SO(d+1) symmetry. Because of topology, these two symmetries are mutually exclusive in one dimension, regardless of the regularization employed, drawing one to a conclusion that the question of "true" hydrogen atom in one dimension doesn't have an answer because a single dimension can not support both of the symmetries of Kepler problem. We argue our findings using a novel method to recover and classify solutions appearing in the literature according to the symmetry they respect. In particular, curious features of some of the solutions - double degeneracy and particle confinement - are directly attributed to the dynamical symmetry behind them.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1510.04509,
  title  = {On the symmetry of a one-dimensional hydrogen atom},
  author = {Boris Ivetic},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1510.04509},
  year   = {2018}
}

Comments

Accepted for publication in J. Math. Phys