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Solutions of the Harmonic Oscillator are *not* always a Combination of Separable Solutions?

Physics Asked on December 27, 2020

Are there solutions of the Schrödinger equation that are not a linear combination of separable solutions and how do we find them?

In Griffiths, Quantum, Prob. 2.49, there is a solution of the (time-dependent) Schrödinger equation, which reads
$$
Psi(x,t)=left(frac{momega}{pihbar}right)^{1/4}expleft[-frac{momega}{2hbar}left(x^2+frac{a^2}{2}(1+e^{-2iomega t})+frac{ihbar t}{m}-2axe^{-iomega t} right)right].
$$

It seems that this is not a linear combination of the stationary states that he found previously in the chapter.

If it is the caes, does that mean that solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation by separation of variables does not yield the general solution as the author claimed? if so, how do we find the other solutions?

One Answer

Sometimes the expansions are not obvious. For example The harmonic oscillator time-dependent Schr"odinger equation $$ ipartial_t psi = -frac 12 partial^2_x psi +frac 12 omega^2 x^2 psi $$ has a ``breathing'' solution $$ psi(x,t)= left(frac{omega}{pi}right)^{1/4}frac 1{sqrt{e^{i omega t} +R e^{-iomega t}}}expleft{ - frac omega 2 left(frac{1-R,e^{-2iomega t}}{1+R,e^{-2iomega t}}right)x^2right}, $$ where the parameter $|R|<1$.

Mehler's formula gives expansion in terms of the states as
$$psi(x,t) {=}pi^{1/4}sum_{n=0}^infty e^{-i(n+1/2) omega t} varphi_n(0)(isqrt R)^n frac{varphi_n(sqrt{omega} x)}{(omega)^{1/4}}. $$ Here $$ varphi_n(x)equiv frac{1}{sqrt{2^n n! sqrt{pi}}} H_n(x) e^{-x^2/2} $$ is the normalized $omega=1$ harmonic oscillator wavefunction. Now $varphi_n(0)$ vanishes if $n$ is odd, and $$ pi^{1/4}varphi_{2n}(0)= frac{1}{sqrt{4^n (2n)! } } frac{(2n)!}{n!}(-1)^{n}. $$ so one has found as set of quite "non obvious" expansion coefficients.

Correct answer by mike stone on December 27, 2020

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