Path integration on Darboux spaces

Abstract

In this paper, the Feynman path integral technique is applied to two-dimensional spaces of nonconstant curvature: these spaces are called Darboux spaces D I-D IV. We start each consideration in terms of the metric and then analyze the quantum theory in the separable coordinate systems. The path integral in each case is formulated and then solved in the majority of cases; the exceptions being the quartic oscillators where no closed solution is known. The required ingredients are the path integral solutions of the linear potential, the harmonic oscillator, the radial harmonic oscillator, the modified Pöschl-Teller potential, and the spheroidal wave functions. The basic path integral solutions, which appear here in a complicated way, have been developed in recent work and are known. The final solutions are represented in terms of the corresponding Green’s functions and the expansions into the wave functions. We also sketch some limiting cases of the Darboux spaces, where spaces of constant negative and zero curvature emerge.