Abstract
We shall describe a mathematical machine which behaves like a laser but which, admittedly, is much simpler than any laser found in the laboratory. Our machine will consist of two main parts: the first one, which is the laser proper, consists of atoms and photons which are the quantized proper vibrations of a resonant cavity. It is essential that the number, N, of atoms be allowed to become very large, but the number of different photon modes can be infinite or finite. This number can in fact be one in order for the machine to operate, but in real life the number of modes is infinite. We can handle the infinite mode case provided that essentially only a finite number of modes is macroscopically excited. As the one-mode case is simpler, we shall mainly discuss it.
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© 1982 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Hepp, K., Lieb, E.H. (1982). The Laser: A Reversible Quantum Dynamical System with Irreversible Classical Macroscopic Motion. In: Nachtergaele, B., Solovej, J.P., Yngvason, J. (eds) Condensed Matter Physics and Exactly Soluble Models. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-06390-3_16
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-06390-3_16
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