Displacement operators: the classical face of their quantum phase

Abstract

In quantum mechanics, the operator representing the displacement of a system in position or momentum is always accompanied by a path-dependent phase factor. In particular, two non-parallel displacements in phase space do not compose together in a simple way, and the order of these displacements leads to different displacement composition phase factors. These phase factors are often attributed to the nonzero commutator between quantum position and momentum operators, but such a mathematical explanation might be unsatisfactory to students who are after more physical insight. We present a couple of simple demonstrations, using classical wave mechanics and classical particle mechanics, that provide some physical intuition for the phase associated with displacement operators.