Applied Bohmian Mechanics: From Nanoscale Systems to Cosmology

by Xavier Oriols Pladevall (Editor), Jordi Mompart (Editor)

Overview

Most textbooks explain quantum mechanics as a story where each step follows naturally from the one preceding it. However, the development of quantum mechanics was exactly the opposite. It was a zigzag route, full of personal disputes where scientists were forced to abandon well-established classical concepts and to explore new and imaginative pathways. Some of the explored routes were successful in providing new mathematical formalisms capable of predicting experiments at the atomic scale. However, even such successful routes were painful enough, so that relevant scientists like Albert Einstein and Erwin Schrödinger decided not to support them.

In this book, the authors demonstrate the huge practical utility of another of these routes in explaining quantum phenomena in many different research fields. Bohmian mechanics, the formulation of the quantum theory pioneered by Louis de Broglie and David Bohm, offers an alternative mathematical formulation of quantum phenomena in terms of quantum trajectories. Novel computational tools to explore physical scenarios that are currently computationally inaccessible, such as many-particle solutions of the Schrödinger equation, can be developed from it.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789814800105
Publisher:	Jenny Stanford Publishing
Publication date:	05/16/2019
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	700
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Xavier Oriols is an associate professor at the UAB. His research interests range from quantum foundations to practical engineering of electron devices. He is the author or coauthor of more than 140 papers and has developed the quantum electron transport simulator, named BITLLES, based on Bohmian mechanics.

Jordi Mompart, after a postdoctoral stay at the Leibniz Universität Hannover, he became an associate professor at the UAB.

Table of Contents

1. Overview of Bohmian Mechanics 2. Hydrogen Photoionization with Strong Lasers 3. Atomtronics. Coherent Control Of Atomic Flow via Adiabatic Passage 4. Bohmian Pathways into Chemistry 5. Adaptive Quantum Monte Carlo Approach States for High-Dimensional Systems 6. Nanoelectronics. Quantum Electron Transport 7. Beyond the Eikonal Approximation in Classical Optics and Quantum Physics 8. Relativistic Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Field Theory 9. Quantum Accelerating Universe 10. Bohmian Quantum Gravity and Cosmology

Editorial Reviews

"Bohmian mechanics, a version of quantum mechanics that is far simpler and much more understandable than the standard textbook theory, has been widely ignored by physicists. Ironically, one of the reasons for this is that since it makes precisely the same predictions for the results of experiments as the standard theory, many believe it to be of little practical value. This book makes the case that this is not so — that the additional resources provided by Bohmian mechanics lead not only to enhanced understanding but also to new tools for dealing with difficult practical quantum problems."
—Prof. Sheldon Goldstein - Rutgers University, USA

"The flow lines associated with quantum matter waves may be helpful for computational or interpretational purposes as demonstrated in this stimulating book, which shows in great detail how the widespread prejudices against Bohmian mechanics should not preclude the use of the underlying formalism for solving practical problems in chemistry and physics."
—Prof. Juan Gonzalo Muga - Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea, Spain

From the Publisher