Wave packet propagation, nonlinear dynamics, and constructing Chaotic Eigenstates

Abstract

Wave packets have by now a long history of contributing to our understanding of many physical phenomena and the relationship between quantum and classical mechanics. They forge one important, intuitive bridge between phase space trajectories and evolving wave functions. A recent excellent discussion of the semiclassical propagation theory and molecular applications is Heller's 1989 Les Houches session LII course entitled "Wave packet dynamics and quantum chaology" published in 1991 [1]. As that name suggests, wave packets are playing an important role in attempts to understand the Correspondence Principle for chaotic systems and is one primary motivation for the work presented in this