Hydrogen atom in the instantaneous van der Waals potential: Pitchfork bifurcation and ro-vibrational structure of the energy spectrum
- Simonovie, N.S. 2
- Salas, J.P. 1
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1
Universidad de La Rioja
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2
Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems
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Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems
Dresde, Alemania
ISSN: 0375-9601
Año de publicación: 2001
Volumen: 279
Número: 5
Páginas: 379-384
Tipo: Artículo
Otras publicaciones en: Physics Letters, Section A: General, Atomic and Solid State Physics
Resumen
We present a semiclassical study of the energy spectrum of a Rydberg hydrogen atom in the instantaneous van der Waals potential. The results are in good agreement with those obtained by the first-order quantum perturbation theory. Both the semiclassical and the quantum calculations show that vibrational energy levels disappear when the magnetic quantum number |m| increases. This fact is well explained in the framework of classical dynamics of this system for which the pitchfork bifurcation takes place at critical value |m|/n =√5/7. © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V.