Quantum-dot helium: An artificial atom with stunning nonlinear properties - Observatoire de la Cote d'Azur
Journal Articles Physics Letters A Year : 2024

Quantum-dot helium: An artificial atom with stunning nonlinear properties

Gilbert Reinisch
  • Function : Author
  • PersonId : 967022

Abstract

This paper is about a "number [which] has been a mystery ever since it was discovered more than fifty years ago, and all good theoretical physicists put this number up on their wall and worry about it." [R. P. Feynman, QED: The strange theory of light and matter, Princeton 1985]. This number (Sommerfeld's fine-structure constant α = e 2 / hbar c ∼ 1/137) appears quite unexpectedly in the nonlinear mean-field Schrödinger-Poisson (SP) description of a non-relativistic quantum system; namely, quantum-dot helium constituted by a pair of 2D parabolically-confined oppositespin electrons entangled in the same singlet state. We show by iteration provided by a quickly convergent series of SP nonlinear eigenstates that the non-orthogonality (or inner product) of the two lowest "s" orbitals approaches asymptotically, within less than 0.5% error, the QED (quantum-electrodynamics) electronic amplitude e^iπ √ α for photon emission or absorption. The appearance of α in the non-relativistic SP system is explained by the role of virtual photons generated by the nonlinearity of the system.
Fichier principal
Vignette du fichier
alphaPhysLettA2023VIDAR.pdf (321.34 Ko) Télécharger le fichier
Origin Files produced by the author(s)

Dates and versions

hal-04444832 , version 1 (07-02-2024)

Identifiers

Cite

Gilbert Reinisch. Quantum-dot helium: An artificial atom with stunning nonlinear properties. Physics Letters A, 2024, 498, pp.129347. ⟨10.1016/j.physleta.2024.129347⟩. ⟨hal-04444832⟩
103 View
66 Download

Altmetric

Share

More