Phys. Rev. A 68, 042308 (2003) [11 pages]Elliptic Rydberg states as direction indicatorsReceived 28 May 2003; published 9 October 2003 The orientation in space of a Cartesian coordinate system can be indicated by the two vectorial constants of motion of a classical Keplerian orbit: the angular momentum and the Laplace-Runge-Lenz vector. In quantum mechanics, the states of a hydrogen atom that mimic classical elliptic orbits are the coherent states of the SO(4) rotation group. It is known how to produce these states experimentally. They have minimal dispersions of the two conserved vectors and can be used as direction indicators. We compare the fidelity of this transmission method with that of the idealized optimal method. © 2003 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.68.042308
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevA.68.042308
PACS:
03.67.Hk, 03.65.Ta, 03.65.Ud
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