MOMENTUM SPACE

REPRESENTATION OF
OPERATORS

- S. Sri Vanaja

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Content :
■ Momentum space
■ Operator
■ Interpretation of Wavefunction
■ Momentum space representation

Reference :
■ Quantum mechanics lecture notes by J. W. Van Orden
■ Quantum physics by Stephen Gasiorowicz
■ https://youtu.be/6v_mj6i4ol - Operators in Quantum mechanics
■ https://en.m.wikipedia,.org - Position and Momentum operator

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Momentum space
■ Momentum space is defined as the set of all momentum vectors p of a
physical system.
■ In quantum mechanics, a particle is described by the means of Quantum
states. This quantum state is represented as a superposition of basic
states or eigenfunctions.
■ If we choose eigenfunction of position operator, then we speak about the
wavefunction in position space.
■ If we choose eigenfunction of momentum operator, then the resulting
wavefunction is said to be wavefunction of momentum space.

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■ The momentum representation of wavefunction is very closely related
to the Fourier transform and the concept of frequency domain.
■ Fourier transform converts the function’s time domain representation
to function’s frequency domain representation.
■ Since for quantum mechanic particle,
Frequency ∝ Momentum
from Fourier transform, describing the particle as a sum of its
momentum is equivalent to describing the particle as a sum of its
frequency component.
■ This momentum space helps to understand the motion of the particle
in space.

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Operators
■ When wavefunction is used to study about the particle, operators are used to study
about the system.
■ In classical mechanics, a particle is described by position, x(t)
To account for its momentum, Newton derived an equation,
𝑑
p=m x(t)
𝑑𝑡
■ In quantum mechanics, a particle is described by the wavefunction Ψ(x,t)
To account for its expectation value for momentum, Schrodinger derived an
expression
ℏ 𝜕
𝑝Ƹ =
i 𝜕𝑥
■ Usually operator doesn’t have any sense only by themselves. To make it sense, it
must operate on something.Here, the momentum operator operates on a
wavefunction,
ℏ 𝜕Ψ
Ƹ x,t) =
𝑝Ψ(
𝑖 𝜕𝑥 5
Interpretation of the Wavefunction
■ In the double slit experiment, the wavefunction Ψ is introduced in order
to describe the interference seen in the distribution of electron at the
second screen but noted that the electrons were still emitted and
detected as particles.
■ Here, we cannot know the path of the electron flow to reach the second
slit, but by measuring the distributions of electrons along the screen for a
given number of electrons, we can determine the probability that an
electron will strike a particular point on the screen.
■ Therefore, the wavefunction is related to the probability.
■ By knowing the probability density P(x,t), we can calculate the
expectation value of momentum,
∗ ℏ 𝜕
<f(p)> = ‫ ׬‬Ψ (𝑥, 𝑡) f( )Ψ 𝑥, 𝑡 𝑑𝑥
𝑖 𝜕𝑥
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Momentum space representation

■ There is a need to know some more aspects of the interpretation of

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■ Now normalizing,
∗ ∗ 1
‫𝜙׬‬ 𝑝 𝜙 𝑝 𝑑𝑝 = ‫𝜙׬‬ 𝑝 𝑑𝑝 ‫׬‬ Ψ 𝑥 𝑒 − 𝑖𝑝𝑥/ℏ𝑑𝑥
√2𝜋ℏ
1 ∗
= ‫׬‬Ψ 𝑥 𝑑𝑥 ‫𝑝 𝜙׬‬ 𝑒 − 𝑖𝑝𝑥/ℏ𝑑𝑝
√2𝜋ℏ
∗
= ‫׬‬Ψ 𝑥 Ψ 𝑥 𝑑𝑥 = 1 ……………(3)

This result is known as the Parseval’s theorem. It states that if a

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■ Next consider
ℏ 𝑑Ψ(𝑥)
<p> = ‫ ׬‬Ψ ∗ (𝑥) 𝑖 𝑑𝑥
ℏ 𝑑 1
= ‫ ׬‬Ψ ∗ (𝑥) 𝑖 𝑑𝑥 √2𝜋ℏ ‫𝑥𝑝𝑖𝑒𝜙 ׬‬/ℏ𝑑𝑝
1 ∗
= ‫𝑝𝑑𝑝 )𝑝(𝜙 ׬‬
Ƹ ‫׬‬ Ψ (𝑥)𝑒𝑖𝑝𝑥/ℏ𝑑𝑥
√2𝜋ℏ
∗
= ‫𝑝 𝑝 𝜙 ׬‬Ƹ 𝜙 𝑝 𝑑𝑝 ……………………(4)
This result together with the previous normalization result, strongly
suggests that 𝜙 𝑝 should be interpreted as the wavefunction in
momentum space, with |𝜙(𝑝)|2 yielding the probability density for finding
the particle with the momentum p.

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■ In the Schrodinger equation in terms of Ψ 𝑥, 𝑡 , we may define 𝜙(𝑝, 𝑡) by
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Ψ 𝑥, 𝑡 = ‫𝜙׬‬ 𝑝, 𝑡 𝑒𝑖𝑝𝑥/ℏ𝑑𝑝 ………………(5)
√2𝜋ℏ

■ The fact in general, 𝜙(𝑝, 𝑡) has a time dependence does not change (3),
(4) or its interpretation.
ℏ 𝜕
■ In spite of this symmetry between x-space and p-space, 𝑝= ො is an
𝑖 𝜕𝑥
operator and x is not but we note that x is in fact an operator too.
■ It happens to have a particularly simple form in x-space, but if we want to
calculate <f(x)> in momentum space, then, we can show by methods very
similar to the ones used above, that
∗ 𝜕
<f(x)> =‫𝜙 ׬‬ 𝑝, 𝑡 𝑓 𝑖ℏ 𝜙 𝑝, 𝑡 𝑑𝑝
𝜕𝑝

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■ In other words, the operator x has the following representation in
momentum space.
𝜕
𝑥ො = 𝑖ℏ
𝜕𝑝
■ Note that the coordinate-space and momentum-space representation
are completely equivalent and the choice of representation is usually
based on the calculational convenience.

■ From this we find that operators play a central role in quantum

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