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Open AccessJournal ArticleDOI

Space-Time Approach to Non-Relativistic Quantum Mechanics

Richard Phillips Feynman
- 01 Apr 1948 - 
- Vol. 20, Iss: 2, pp 367-387
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TLDR
In this paper, the authors formulated non-relativistic quantum mechanics in a different way and showed that the probability of an event which can happen in several different ways is the absolute square of a sum of complex contributions, one from each alternative way.
Abstract
Non-relativistic quantum mechanics is formulated here in a different way. It is, however, mathematically equivalent to the familiar formulation. In quantum mechanics the probability of an event which can happen in several different ways is the absolute square of a sum of complex contributions, one from each alternative way. The probability that a particle will be found to have a path x(t) lying somewhere within a region of space time is the square of a sum of contributions, one from each path in the region. The contribution from a single path is postulated to be an exponential whose (imaginary) phase is the classical action (in units of ℏ) for the path in question. The total contribution from all paths reaching x, t from the past is the wave function ψ(x, t). This is shown to satisfy Schroedinger's equation. The relation to matrix and operator algebra is discussed. Applications are indicated, in particular to eliminate the coordinates of the field oscillators from the equations of quantum electrodynamics.

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The Theory of a general quantum system interacting with a linear dissipative system

TL;DR: In this paper, a formalism has been developed, using Feynman's space-time formulation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics whereby the behavior of a system of interest, which is coupled to other external quantum systems, may be calculated in terms of its own variables only.
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Coherently wired light-harvesting in photosynthetic marine algae at ambient temperature

TL;DR: Observations provide compelling evidence for quantum-coherent sharing of electronic excitation across the 5-nm-wide proteins under biologically relevant conditions, suggesting that distant molecules within the photosynthetic proteins are ‘wired’ together by quantum coherence for more efficient light-harvesting in cryptophyte marine algae.
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Coherent states: Theory and some Applications

TL;DR: In this article, a general algorithm for constructing coherent states of dynamical groups for a given quantum physical system is presented, and the result is that the coherent states are isomorphic to a coset space of group geometrical space.
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Loop Quantum Cosmology: A Status Report

TL;DR: Loop quantum cosmology (LQC) as mentioned in this paper is the result of applying principles of loop quantum gravity to cosmological settings, where quantum geometry creates a brand new repulsive force which is totally negligible at low spacetime curvature but rises very rapidly in the Planck regime, overwhelming the classical gravitational attraction.
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Semiclassical approximations in wave mechanics

TL;DR: In this article, a review of various methods of deriving expressions for quantum-mechanical quantities in the limit when hslash is small (in comparison with the relevant classical action functions) is presented.