1 Details of the calculation in Lecture 6, Part IV

In Lecture 6, Part IV, we encountered the following equation for two electrons
attracting one another in a Fermi sea:
h
2
p
2
m
( p) V
0
_
|| p|pF|< hkD
d
3
p
(2h)
3
( p) = E( p), (1)
where ( p) is the two-particle wave-function in the momentum space, m is
the electron mass, V
0
is the eective interaction constant (attraction), and the
constraints in the integral correspond to electrons interacting in a narrow shell
near the Fermi surface (k
D
is the typical phonons wave-vector - the so-called
Debye wave-vector). It is important that phonons momentum is much smaller
than that of electrons hk
D
p
F
, as discussed in the lectures. Finally, the
energy of the two particles is
E = 2E
F
+ ,
where E
F
=
p
2
F
2m
is the Fermi energy and is the main quantity of interest - the
pairing energy of two electrons. The pairing is possible if and only if a solution
to Eq. (1) exists with < 0 (which physically implies that the electrons can
nd a way to lower their energy via pairing and becoming bosons the Cooper
pairs; the latter eventually condense and their Bose-Einstein condensate is a
superconductor as discussed throughout Lecture 6).
Using the shorthand notation for the integral over p in Eq. (1) as
_
p
. . ., we
can re-write the latter as follows:
_
h
2
p
2
m
2E
F

_
( p) = V
0
_
p
( p). (2)
Let us divide both sides of this equation by the expression in the square
brackets and integrate over the momentum, then Eq. (2) becomes:
_
p
( p) = V
0
_
p
( p)
_
p
1
_
h
2
p
2
m
2E
F

_ (3)
Note that (just like in Parts III and IV of Lecture 5) the term in the left-
hand side (an unknown constant) cancels out the corresponding integral in the
right-hand side, leading to the following self-consistency equation [which is one
of the key equations of the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieer (BCS) theory of super-
conductivity, often called the BCS self-consistency equation]:
1 = V
0
_
p
1
_
h
2
p
2
m
2E
F

_ (4)
1
Since all the action happens near the Fermi surface [i.e., | p| p
F
, as follows
from the constraints in Eq. (4)], we can simplify the integral as follows:
_
p
. . .
_
|| p|pF|< hkD
d
3
p
(2h)
3
. . . =
1
(2h)
3
_
|| p|pF|< hkD
d
p
p
2
dp
Since nothing depends on the angles, we can integrate over d
p
leading to
a factor of 4 (see, Lecture 5, Part IV). We can also introduce a new variable
(which has the physical meaning of the electron energy relative to the threshold
- Fermi - energy)
=
p
2
2m
E
F
and approximate the remaining momentum term in the numerator as p p
F
(that is, p
2
dp = mpd(
p
2
2m
) mp
F
d).
With this, Eq. (4) becomes
1 = V
0
mp
F
(2h)
3
(4)
. .
N0
h
D
_
0
d
2
(5)
Calculating the remaining elementary integral, we nd:
1 =
V
0
N
0
2
ln
_
h
D
/2
/2
_

V
0
N
0
2
ln
_
2 h
D

_
. (6)
Resolving this equation for , we obtain one of the main results of the theory
of superconductivity - the energy of a two-electron bound state (Cooper pair)
in a superconductor:
2 h
D
exp
_

2
V
0
N
0
_
. (7)
2