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Heisenberg’s invention of matrices

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Abstract

Richard Feynman once said: “nobody understands quantum mechanics”. Still, those who devised it are perhaps the ones closest to understanding their creation. It suggests that whenever the weirdness of quantum mechanics haunts you, it is better to go back to its creators in terms of their original publications. In the present article, the author has tried to seek help from Heisenberg’s 1925 paper, in order to reduce the weirdness of going from classical observables to quantum operators.

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Suggested Reading

  1. W Heisenberg, The Physical Principles Of the Quantum Theory, Dover Publications, New York, 1949.

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  3. G Gamow, Thirty Years That Shook Physics: The Story of Quantum Theory, Dover Publications, New York, 1966.

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  4. S Tomonaga, Quantum Mechanics, North-Holland, Amsterdam, 1962.

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Correspondence to Pradeep Kumar.

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Pradeep Kumar works as Assistant Professor at the Department of Chemistry, Malaviya National Institute of Technology, Jaipur. He is working in the fleld of electronic structure calculation, quantum dynamics, and their applications in atmospheric science and spectroscopy.

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Kumar, P. Heisenberg’s invention of matrices. Reson 22, 399–405 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-017-0479-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-017-0479-9

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