Symmetry chains and adaptation coefficients

Abstract

Given a symmetry chain of physical significance it becomes necessary to obtain states which transform properly with respect to the symmetries of the chain. In this article we describe a method which permits us to calculate symmetry-adapted quantum states with relative ease. The coefficients for the symmetry-adapted linear combinations are obtained, in numerical form, in terms of the original states of the system and can thus be represented in the form of numerical tables. In addition, one also obtains automatically the matrix elements for the operators of the symmetry groups which are involved, and thus for any physical operator which can be expressed either as an element of the algebra or of the enveloping algebra. The method is well suited for computers once the physically relevant symmetry chain, or chains, have been defined. While the method to be described is generally applicable to any physical system for which semisimple Lie algebras play a role we choose here a familiar example in order to illustrate the method and to illuminate its simplicity. We choose the nuclear shell model for the case of two nucleons with orbital angular momentum l=1. While the states of the entire shell transform like the smallest spin representation of SO(25) we restrict our attention to its subgroup SU(6)×SU(2)T. We determine the symmetry chains which lead to total angular momentum SU(2)J and obtain the symmetry-adapted states for these chains.