Path-integral derivation of the anomaly for the Hermitian equivalent of the complex PT-symmetric quartic Hamiltonian
Creators
- 1. Physics Department, Imperial College, London SW7 (United Kingdom)
- 2. Departamento de Fisica Teorica, Atomica y Optica, Facultad de Ciencias, E-47011, Valladolid (Spain)
Description
It can be shown using operator techniques that the non-Hermitian PT-symmetric quantum mechanical Hamiltonian with a 'wrong-sign' quartic potential -gx4 is equivalent to a Hermitian Hamiltonian with a positive quartic potential together with a linear term. A naieve derivation of the same result in the path-integral approach misses this linear term. In a recent paper by Bender et al. it was pointed out that this term was in the nature of a parity anomaly and a more careful, discretized treatment of the path integral appeared to reproduce it successfully. However, on re-examination of this derivation we find that a yet more careful treatment is necessary, keeping terms that were ignored in that paper. An alternative, much simpler derivation is given using the additional potential that has been shown to appear whenever a change of variables to curvilinear coordinates is made in a functional integral
Additional details
Identifiers
- DOI
- 10.1103/PhysRevD.74.125022;
- arXiv
- arXiv:hep-th/0610245v1;
Publishing Information
- Journal Title
- Physical Review. D, Particles Fields
- Journal Volume
- 74
- Journal Issue
- 12
- Journal Page Range
- p. 125022-125022.6
- ISSN
- 0556-2821
- CODEN
- PRVDAQ
INIS
- Country of Publication
- United States
- Country of Input or Organization
- International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
- INIS RN
- 38039340
- Subject category
- S72: PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS; S71: CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS;
- Descriptors DEI
- CURVILINEAR COORDINATES; HAMILTONIANS; PARITY; PATH INTEGRALS; POTENTIALS; QUANTUM FIELD THEORY; QUANTUM MECHANICS
- Descriptors DEC
- COORDINATES; FIELD THEORIES; INTEGRALS; MATHEMATICAL OPERATORS; MECHANICS; PARTICLE PROPERTIES; QUANTUM OPERATORS
Optional Information
- Notes
- (c) 2006 The American Physical Society