Can Creation and Annihilation Operators Solve the Hydrogen Atom Problem?

crawf_777
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Just a quick question regarding the solution of the hydrogen atom: is it possible to solve the hydrogen atom problem via creation and annihilation operators as is the case with the harmonic oscillator?

Any help here greatly appreciated!

Crawf.
 
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Yes, of course. See the book of D. Fitts: <Principles of Quantum Mechanics - As Applied to Chemistry and Chemical Physics>, from page 161 onwards.
 
Thanks very much for the ref! I'll have a look at said book!
 
The solution provided in the book I mentioned covers only the discrete spectrum. I don't know if a similar analysis has been performed for the continuous spectrum as well.
 
If you think the answer is 'yes of course' let's see you do it for the finite square well!

It's automatic only in the following sense: you have a bunch of states and can always define stepping operators that take you from one state to the next. But as a practical matter, the fact that the hydrogen atom can be solved by the use of stepping operators is far from automatic: it's a miracle!

The Hamiltonian is a quadratic expression in x and p, and the miracle is that this expression can be factored into a product of linear factors. You can explain this as do to the remarkable algebraic properties of Hermite polynomials and Laguerre functions. Or you can ascribe it to 'extra' symmetries, such as the Runge-Lenz vector. But there are very few systems that can be handled this way.
 
It's called "supersymmetric method" if I recall correctly.
 
Thanks for your useful input Bill_K. (and TTB).
 
Visualize charge density

I want to use Matlab to visualize charge density aroud hydrogen nuclear atom. I have had wave function already. Does anyone know how to do it?
Thanks in advance
 
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