A unified treatment of the groups SO(4) and SO(3,1)

Abstract

The irreducible representations of the group SO(4) in which the SO(3) subgroup is reduced are studied by an explicit construction of the operators and the basis in the spinor representation. The basis function which is formally identical with that for the coupling of two angular momentaj ₁ andj ₂ is expressible in terms of a hypergeometric function and strongly resembles the one for the irreducible representations of the groups SO(3,1). For the Lorentz group, the bases for the unitary representations which require unphysical values ofj ₁ andj ₂ are found to be analytic continuation of those for SO(4). The realization of the unitary irreducible representations of the group SO(4) in the Hilbert space of these functions leads, for appropriate unphysical values ofj ₁,j ₂, to the Gelfand-Naimark formula for the principal and complementary series of the representations of SO(3;1). The matrix elements for finite transformations of SO(4) and SO(3,1) can be evaluated, in this approach, in a unified manner by using standard properties of the hypergeometric function. These turn out to be a finite sum of₃ F ₂-functions which, as expected, are polynomials for SO(4) and infinite series for SO(3,1). A number of special matrix elements are calculated from the general formula and these agree with the results obtained previously.