English

Spin operator in the Dirac theory

Quantum Physics 2013-08-23 v1

Abstract

We find all spin operators for a Dirac particle satisfying the following very general conditions: (i) spin does not convert positive (negative) energy states into negative (positive) energy states, (ii) spin is a pseudo-vector, and (iii) eigenvalues of the projection of a spin operator on an arbitrary direction are independent of this direction (isotropy condition). We show that there are four such operators and all of them fulfill the standard su(2) Lie algebra commutation relations. Nevertheless, only one of them has a proper non-relativistic limit and acts in the same way on negative and positive energy states. We show also that this operator is equivalent to the Newton-Wigner spin operator and Foldy-Wouthuysen mean-spin operator. We also discuss another operators proposed in the literature.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1308.4313,
  title  = {Spin operator in the Dirac theory},
  author = {Pawel Caban and Jakub Rembieliński and Marta Włodarczyk},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1308.4313},
  year   = {2013}
}

Comments

9 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-22T01:12:10.175Z