Superposition of Quantum Harmonic Oscillator Eigenstates: Expectation Values and Uncertainties

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This Demonstration studies a superposition of two quantum harmonic oscillator eigenstates in the position and momentum representations. The superposition consists of two eigenstates , where
and
is the
Hermite polynomial; the representations are connected via
. The top-left panel shows the position space probability density
, position expectation value
, and position uncertainty
. The top-right panel shows the momentum space probability density
, momentum expectation value
, and momentum uncertainty
. The lower two panels show the real and imaginary parts of the wavefunction.
Contributed by: Porscha McRobbie and Eitan Geva (March 2011)
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA