Quantum mechanics of the damped harmonic oscillator

Abstract

We quantize the system of a damped harmonic oscillator coupled to its time-reversed image, known as Bateman's dual system. By using the Feynman–Hibbs method, the time-dependent quantum states of such a system are constructed entirely in the framework of the classical theory. The geometric phase is calculated and found to be proportional to the ground-state energy of the one-dimensional linear harmonic oscillator to which the two-dimensional system reduces under appropriate constraint. PACS Nos.: 03.65Ta, 03.65Vf, 03.65Ca, 03.65Fd