English

Optimizing adiabaticity in quantum mechanics

Quantum Physics 2013-02-07 v1

Abstract

A condition on the Hamiltonian of a time-dependent quantum mechanical system is derived which, if satisfied, implies optimal adiabaticity (defined below). The condition is expressed in terms of the Hamiltonian and in terms of the evolution operator related to it. Since the latter depends in a complicated way on the Hamiltonian, it is not yet clear how the condition can be used to extract useful information about the optimal Hamiltonian. The condition is tested on an exactly-soluble time-dependent problem (a spin in a magnetic field), where perfectly adiabatic evolution can be easily identified.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1109.2565,
  title  = {Optimizing adiabaticity in quantum mechanics},
  author = {R. MacKenzie and M. Pineault and L. Renaud-Desjardins},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1109.2565},
  year   = {2013}
}

Comments

5 pages, 2 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-21T19:03:39.148Z