Multipole expansions and intense fields

Abstract

In the context of two-body bound-state systems subjected to a plane-wave electromagnetic field, it is shown that high field intensity introduces a distinction between long-wavelength approximation and electric dipole approximation. This distinction is gauge dependent, since it is absent in Coulomb gauge, whereas in "completed" gauges of G\"oppert-Mayer type the presence of high field intensity makes electric quadrupole and magnetic dipole terms of importance equal to electric dipole at long wavelengths. Another consequence of high field intensity is that multipole expansions lose their utility in view of the equivalent importance of a number of low-order multipole terms and the appearance of large-magnitude terms which defy multipole categorization. This loss of the multipole expansion is gauge independent. Also gauge independent is another related consequence of high field intensity, which is the intimate coupling of center-of-mass and relative coordinate motions in a two-body system.