Abstract
An extremum principle was postulated by Horne, Finkelstein, Shull, Zeilinger, and Bernstein in order to derive the physically allowable parameters for sinusoidal standing waves governing a neutron in a crystal which is immersed in a strong external magnetic field: “the expectation value of the total potential 〈V〉 is an extremum.” We show that this extremum principle can be obtained from the variational principle used by Schrodinger to derive his nonrelativistic wave equation. We rederive the solutions found by the above-mentioned authors as well as some additional solutions.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
M. A. Horne, K. D. Finkelstein, C. G. Shull, A. Zeilinger, and H. J. Bernstein, Physica B 151, 189-192 (1988).
K. D. Finkelstein, Neutron Spin-Pendelloesung Resonance, Ph.D. thesis (Physics Department, MIT, Cambridge, MA, 1987).
H. Rauch and D. Petrascheck, in Neutron Diffraction, H. Dachs, ed. (Springer, Berlin, 1978). M. Horne, I. Jex, and A. Zeilinger, Phys. Rev. B (1998), in press.
E. Schrödinger, Ann. Phys. (Leipzig ) 79, 361-376 (1926); reprinted in E. Schrödinger, Collected Papers on Wave Mechanics, J. F. Shearer and W. H. Deans, trans. (Blackie and Sons, London, 1928).
P. M. Morse and H. Feshbach, Methods of Theoretical Physics, Vol. 1 (McGraw-Hill, New York, 1953).
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Jaeger, G., Shimony, A. An Extremum Principle for a Neutron Diffraction Experiment. Foundations of Physics 29, 435–444 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018823116843
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018823116843