What do the symbols in quantum equations mean?

[electrogluon]

I have a good understanding of general quantum physics but not so much of an understanding of the mathematics around equations,
such as the equations on wikipeadia under the quantum physics page to understand any of the equations you much first know what the symbols in the equation means
can anyone suggest a website that may have some form of index for these symbols on

 

[malawi_glenn]

There is no 100% standard notation.

Can you tell us exactly which wiki page you are wondering about? Almost all wiki pages have explanations of formulas.

And who can you understand quantum physics with no mathametics? :P

 

[electrogluon]

for example i would like to understand the working of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirac_notation"
but there other pages which don,t have any explanation to the the symbols used
such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_Field_Theory"

thankyou for helping

 

[malawi_glenn]

But everything is introduced in that wiki-article, there is nothing more to add. It is just what you would find in an ordinary QM textbook such as Sakurai.

There are not so many equations in the QFT page, just some fields etc.

 

[tiny-tim]

Welcome to PF!

Hi electrogluon! Welcome to PF!

Type out the symbols you don't understand, and then we can help!

 

[ice109]

I have a good understanding of general quantum physics but not so much of an understanding of the mathematics around equations,
such as the equations on wikipeadia under the quantum physics page to understand any of the equations you much first know what the symbols in the equation means
can anyone suggest a website that may have some form of index for these symbols on

? how does that even make sense ?

 

[electrogluon]

$$\sum$$ "sum"

$$\phi$$ "phi"

$$\prod$$ "prod"

these are the main symbols i don,t understand but also i don,t understand what the doots mean inbetween symbols like in this equation

 

[tiny-tim]

ok … ∑ means the sum of the thing after the ∑, over all possible values of the variable (in your example. over all values of p in the set S_N)

that big π is the same, except it means the product, not the sum (so n! = bigπ(i) over i ≤ n)

φ is just the usual syymbol for a wave-function … it's an unknown, like "x" … you could use any symbol, but it's easier to read if everybody uses the same one

and the dots mean φ1, φ2, φ3, and so on until you get to φN )

Anything else?

 

[electrogluon]

thankyou for explaining it you've helped a lot with my research