A QUANTUM-CLASSICAL APPROACH TO MOLECULAR DYNAMICS

Abstract

We present a new method for treating the dynamics of molecular systems. The method has been named "quantum dressed" classical mechanics and is based on an expansion of the wave function in a time-dependent basis-set, the Gauss–Hermite basis-set. From here it is possible to proceed in two ways, one is in principle exact and the other approximate. In the exact approach one constructs a discrete variable representation (DVR) in which the grid points are defined by the Hermite part of the Gauss–Hermite basis set. In the approximate method a second order expansion of the potential around the classical trajectories is introduced and the quantum dymamics solved in a second quantization rather than a wave-function representation.