Feynman's thesis : a new approach to quantum theory / editor, Laurie M. Brown.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Feynman, Richard P. (Richard Phillips), 1918-1988.

Contributor:

Brown, Laurie M.

Craig M. Merrihue Memorial Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Quantum theory.

Least action.

Lagrangian functions.

Genre:

Academic theses.

Physical Description:

xxii, 119 pages ; 23 cm

Other Title:

New approach to quantum theory

Place of Publication:

Singapore ; Hackensack, NJ : World Scientific, [2005]

Summary:

Richard Feynman's never previously published doctoral thesis formed the heart of much of his brilliant and profound work in theoretical physics. Entitled ?The Principle of Least Action in Quantum Mechanics, ? its original motive was to quantize the classical action-at-a-distance electrodynamics. Because that theory adopted an overall space?time viewpoint, the classical Hamiltonian approach used in the conventional formulations of quantum theory could not be used, so Feynman turned to the Lagrangian function and the principle of least action as his points of departure. The result was the path integral approach, which satisfied ? and transcended ? its original motivation, and has enjoyed great success in renormalized quantum field theory, including the derivation of the ubiquitous Feynman diagrams for elementary particles. Path integrals have many other applications, including atomic, molecular, and nuclear scattering, statistical mechanics, quantum liquids and solids, Brownian motion, a

Contents:

The principle of least action in quantum mechanics / R.P. Feynman

Space-time approach to non-relativistic quantum mechanics / R.P. Feynman

The Lagrangian in quantum mechanics / P.A.M. Dirac.

Notes:

First paper originally presented as R.P. Feynman's thesis (Ph. D.--Princeton University, 1942).

Second paper originally published: 1948; third paper originally published: 1933.

Includes bibliographical references.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Craig M. Merrihue Memorial Fund.

Contains:

Feynman, Richard P. (Richard Phillips), 1918-1988. Principle of least action in quantum mechanics.

Feynman, Richard P. (Richard Phillips), 1918-1988. Space-time approach to non-relativistic quantum mechanics.

Dirac, P. A. M. (Paul Adrien Maurice), 1902-1984. Lagrangian in quantum mechanics.

Principle of least action in quantum mechanics.

Space-time approach to non-relativistic quantum mechanics.

Lagrangian in quantum mechanics.

ISBN:

9812563660

9812563806

OCLC:

62332166