4

ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION AND MATTER

with p = (p, iE) and A = (A, i ), c = 1. The word minimal indicates that no additional terms that would in principle be allowed are included (experiment is the arbiter). An example would be a term that accounts for the intrinsic magnetic moment of the particle. As is known from the study of an atom in an external static magnetic eld, the Hamiltonian Equation (1.1) already accounts for a magnetic moment associated with orbital angular momentum. To obtain the Hamiltonian of the quantized system we use as always the replacements p or in covariant form p 1 i H (or E) 1 1 = i x i 1 i t (1.5)

(1.6)

The requirement that the substitutions in Equation (1.5) be covariant, that is, that they can be written in the form of Equation (1.6), explains the minus sign in Equation (1.5). The substitutions are a manifestation of First Quantization in which momenta and energies, and functions dependent upon these, become operators. They lead to the commutation relations [p , x ] = 1 i (1.7)

where is the Kronecker delta. The question arises as to how to quantize the electromagnetic eld. We know from the hypothesis of Planck and its extension by Einstein in the treatment of black body radiation and the photo-electric effect respectively that electromagnetic energy is quantized with quanta equal . The replacements Equation (1.6) are of no use for an explanation. We will address this issue fully in the next subsection when we introduce Second Quantization in which the vector and scalar potentials and thus the electric and magnetic elds become operators. This is a prototype of relativistic quantum eld theory. In preparation for quantization of the electromagnetic eld, we will briey review the arguments that lead to the wave equation for A with = 0 (the Coulomb Gauge). Recall from classical electromagnetism that when the vector and scalar potentials are transformed into new ones by the Gauge transformation A A = A + = t (1.8)