I Understanding the Absence of Rabi Oscillations in the Interaction Picture

Jufa
Messages
101
Reaction score
15
TL;DR Summary
When working in the interaction picture one is free to choose the unitary transformation that seems helpful. How can I show that the dynamics of the problem are independent of such choice.
When working on the interaction picture you can show that in a certain rotating frame the Hamiltonian of a 2-level system (for example) becomes uncoupled. This implies that in such frame there are no Rabi oscillations or other dynamical phenomena, this seems weird to me and I would like to know how is this understood.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
Quantum mechanics can be formulated in a covariant way, i.e., such that the observable quantities (probabilities, expectation values of observables, cross sections in scattering theory etc. etc.) are by construction picture independent. There's a recent thread on this topic here at PF:

https://www.physicsforums.com/threa...ry-transformations-of-the-hamiltonian.979107/
A somewhat shortened derivation starting from the Schrödinger picture can be found on my posting #7 in this thread, though, as I said, you can formulate QT completely covariantly under "time-evolution-picture transformations" from the very beginning.
 
  • Like
Likes Jufa
Not an expert in QM. AFAIK, Schrödinger's equation is quite different from the classical wave equation. The former is an equation for the dynamics of the state of a (quantum?) system, the latter is an equation for the dynamics of a (classical) degree of freedom. As a matter of fact, Schrödinger's equation is first order in time derivatives, while the classical wave equation is second order. But, AFAIK, Schrödinger's equation is a wave equation; only its interpretation makes it non-classical...
Insights auto threads is broken atm, so I'm manually creating these for new Insight articles. Towards the end of the first lecture for the Qiskit Global Summer School 2025, Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, Olivia Lanes (Global Lead, Content and Education IBM) stated... Source: https://www.physicsforums.com/insights/quantum-entanglement-is-a-kinematic-fact-not-a-dynamical-effect/ by @RUTA
Is it possible, and fruitful, to use certain conceptual and technical tools from effective field theory (coarse-graining/integrating-out, power-counting, matching, RG) to think about the relationship between the fundamental (quantum) and the emergent (classical), both to account for the quasi-autonomy of the classical level and to quantify residual quantum corrections? By “emergent,” I mean the following: after integrating out fast/irrelevant quantum degrees of freedom (high-energy modes...
Back
Top