Linked Questions

2 votes
0 answers
117 views

What is the physical meaning of the "decay rate" in Fermis golden rule? [duplicate]

As far as I understood, Fermi's golden rule gives a prediction of the transition rate in a perturbed quantum system $H_0+V$ between two eigenstates of the unperturbed system $H_0$, say from $\left| i\...
flonk's user avatar
  • 183
14 votes
5 answers
1k views

Transition probability derivation: How to prove $\lim_{\alpha\rightarrow\infty} \frac{\sin^2\alpha x}{\alpha x^2} ~=~\pi\delta(x)$?

How to prove $$\lim_{\alpha\rightarrow\infty} \frac{\sin^2\alpha x}{\alpha x^2} ~=~\pi\delta(x)~?$$ I have encountered this limit while learning time dependent perturbation and transition ...
levitt's user avatar
  • 797
8 votes
4 answers
8k views

Fermi's Golden Rule and Density of States

I know Fermi's Golden Rule in the form $$\Gamma_{fi} ~=~ \sum_{f}\frac{2\pi}{\hbar}\delta (E_f - E_i)|M_{fi}|^2,$$ where $\Gamma_{fi}$ is the probability transition rate, $M_{fi}$ are the transition ...
Edward Hughes's user avatar
5 votes
3 answers
2k views

What is the Quantum Transition Time for Photon Emission?

When an electron in an atom changes energy states to emit a photon, how long does the process take? Is this question even meaningful?
user avatar
13 votes
1 answer
907 views

Energy conservation for finite times in Fermi’s Golden Rule

In the derivation of Fermi’s Golden rule for the application of a sudden constant perturbation, we get the following formula for the rate: $$ P_{f \leftarrow i}(t) = |\langle f|V|i\rangle|^2 \frac{4\...
Alex Gower's user avatar
  • 2,654
6 votes
1 answer
1k views

When does the Fermi golden rule break down?

It is widely used in all fields of physics. However, how accurate is it? It seems that many people use it without estimating its accuracy. When does it break down? Any example?
poisson's user avatar
  • 2,165
10 votes
1 answer
992 views

Fermi's golden rule and infinite probablity?

I am slightly confused about the application of Fermi's golden rule. Which during standard derivations indicates a probability of transitioning from the state $|i \rangle$ to the state $|f\rangle$ of: ...
Quantum spaghettification's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
502 views

In Fermi's Golden Rule, does the transition probability increase linearly with time or quadratically with time?

When deriving Fermi's Golden rule, we get that the probability of a quantum system transitioning from an initial state $|i\rangle$ to a final state $|f\rangle$ is $$P_{i\rightarrow f}(t)=\frac{|V_{fi}|...
SalahTheGoat's user avatar
  • 1,599
2 votes
1 answer
1k views

Limit of the $\sin^2$ function in the derivation of Fermi's golden rule

In the derivation of Fermi's golden rule one typically arrives at an expression of the form $$ \frac{\sin^2(\omega t)}{\omega^2} $$ which is then converted to $$ \pi t\delta(\omega). $$ I cannot ...
Hans Wurst's user avatar
  • 1,616
5 votes
1 answer
647 views

Rate in Fermi's golden rule

There is a very clear derivation of Fermi's golden rule (actually Dirac's) here. Everything runs smoothly until, somehow, the equivalence $$ \Gamma_{a \rightarrow b} = \frac{P_{a \rightarrow b}}{t} $$...
nabla's user avatar
  • 643
4 votes
1 answer
817 views

Fermi Golden Rule

First order time dependent perturbation theory tells us that under the influence of a perturbation $Ve^{i\omega t}$, a system that started in the state $|n\rangle$ at time $t=0$ has probability $$P_k(...
Watw's user avatar
  • 1,229
1 vote
2 answers
630 views

Probability density in Fermi golden rule

Consider Fermi golden rule $$\Gamma _{{i\rightarrow f}}={\frac {2\pi }{\hbar }}\left|\langle f|H'|i\rangle \right|^{{2}}\rho $$ I don't understand why $\left|\langle f|H'|i\rangle \right|^{{2}}$ is ...
Sørën's user avatar
  • 2,637
1 vote
2 answers
560 views

Why does a "constant" perturbation favour the transition at $\omega_{fi}=0$?

For a constant perturbation of the form $$\hat{H'}(t)=\hat{V}\theta(t)$$ to a time-independent Hamiltonian $\hat{H}_0$, the transition probability at time $t$ from an eigenstate $|i\rangle$ of $\hat{H}...
Solidification's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
603 views

Fermi's golden rule and Fock states

I am having trouble understanding the derivation of the rate of spontaneous and stimulated emission given in this link. We have a perturbation that takes the form: $$ \hat H=\sum_{\vec k}f(\vec r,\...
Quantum spaghettification's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
195 views

Why do we need large time assumption for energy conservation in electron transitions?

For electron absorption calculations (with an electric field perturbation $\Delta H = eE_0x \cos(\omega t)$) we end up with an integral like: $$c_2(t) \propto \int \rho(\omega) \left( \frac{\sin(\...
Alex Gower's user avatar
  • 2,654
1 vote
1 answer
753 views

Correlation Amplitude in QM

The following is a section "Correlation Amplitude and the Energy-Time Uncertainty Relation" from Sakurai's Modern Quantum Mechanics book page 79: Question: Why does it state that the oscillations ...
user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
607 views

Dirac-delta function in Derivation of Fermi's Golden Rule

I was following along Mark Thomson's Modern Particle Physics, and got stuck on this book's derivation of Fermi's Golden Rule (On page 53): "... If there are d$n$ accessible final states in the ...
Andri jauhari's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
218 views

Feynman, Hibbs Perturbations and Energy

I am currently self-studying from Feynman & Hibbs’ Quantum Mecahnics and Path Integrals, but having an issue understanding a step in their development of first-order perturbations. They define $$...
Bob Arthur's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
122 views

State transition (continuum)

If we assume that because of factors, a quantum mechanical system needs to rearrange itself, and in doing so, it might change it's state, to another one. In our consideration, we tried to find the ...
imbAF's user avatar
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