1

I'm working on Problem 3A of Georgi's Lie Algebra's in Particle Physics. I'm trying to show that, $$\{j\} \otimes \{s\} = \sum\limits_{\oplus\ell =|s-j|}^{s+j}\{\ell\}$$ where $\{k\}$ is the spin-$k$ representation of $SU(2)$. I've seen an explicit version of this in an answer to this post (Decomposition of tensor product space into direct sum) using characters.

My current thinking is to use the property $$J_\alpha^{j\otimes s} = [J_\alpha^j]_{ab}\delta_{cd}+\delta_{ab}[J_\alpha^s]_{cd}.$$

But I'm generally just confused about how I'm supposed to use the highest weight decomposition for this and any tips would be very much appreciated.

  • You've wantonly hyperformalized your problem through coproduct dandyism that you have forgotten the basic addition of angular momentum though the ladder algorithm you learned in college! – Cosmas Zachos Nov 04 '21 at 22:20
  • I'm still in college and the problem came hyperformalized! Although that did make me laugh. But I will go back to looking at the addition of angular momentum and try to do the problem from that direction, thanks! – Liam Bonds Nov 04 '21 at 22:25
  • After you appreciate the answer from spin addition, you may translate to mathematese. This answer might illustrate the simplest case... Then generalize. – Cosmas Zachos Nov 04 '21 at 23:04

1 Answers1

0

This is the answer from Zuber's note.

Consider the tensor product of two representations of spin $j_1$ and $j_2$ and their decomposition on vectors of given total spin (decomposition into irreducible representation). We start with the product representation spanned by the basis, \begin{equation}\label{basis1} |j_1,m_1\rangle\otimes |j_2,m_2\rangle =|j_1,m_1;j_2,m_2\rangle\equiv |m_1,m_2\rangle \end{equation} on which the generators act as, \begin{align} \mathbf{J}=\mathbf{J}^{(1)}\otimes \mathbf{1}^{(2)}+\mathbf{1}^{(1)}\otimes \mathbf{J}^{(2)} \end{align} which is frequently written as, \begin{align} \mathbf{J}=\mathbf{J}^{(1)}+ \mathbf{J}^{(2)} \end{align} and in quantum mechanics we talk about the addition of angular momenta $\mathbf{J}^{(1)}$ and $\mathbf{J}^{(2)}$. The upper index indicates on which space the operators act.

Thus the decomposition of the tensor product becomes to decompose the basis of $\mathbf{J}^{(1)}$ and $\mathbf{J}^{(2)}$ onto a basis of eigenvectors of $\mathbf{J}$ and $J_z$. Since ${\mathbf{J}^{(1)}}^2$ and ${\mathbf{J}^{(2)}}^2$ commute with one another and with $\mathbf{J}^2$ and $J_z$, we may seek common eigenvectors which can be denoted by $|J,M\rangle$, \begin{align} |J,M\rangle\equiv |J,M,(j_1,j_2)\rangle \end{align} where it is understood that the value of $j_1$ and $j_2$ is fixed. The question is thus twofold: which values can $J$ and $M$ take; and what is the matrix of the change of basis from $|m_1,m_2\rangle$ to $|J,M\rangle$? In other words, what are the Clebsch-Gordan coefficients?

The possible values of $M$, eigenvalue of $J_z$ can be found, \begin{align} \langle m_1,m_2|J_z|J,M\rangle &=M\langle m_1,m_2|J,M\rangle\nonumber\\[5pt] &=\langle m_1,m_2|J^{(1)}_z+J^{(2)}_z|J,M\rangle =(m_1+m_2)\langle m_1,m_2|J,M\rangle \end{align} If $\langle m_1,m_2|J,M\rangle\neq 0$, the only possible value of $M$ is \begin{align}\label{keyeq} M=m_1+m_2,\,\,\,\,\,\, m_1\in(-j_1,\cdots,j_1),\,\,\,\,\,\, m_2\in(-j_2,\cdots,j_2) \end{align} For fixed $j_1, j_2$ and $M$, there are many possible basis $|m_1,m_2\rangle$ with eigenvalue of $M$. With fixed $j_1, j_2$ and $M$, the number of solution to the above equation is given by $n(M)$, \begin{align} n(M)=\left\{ \begin{aligned} 0&,\,\,\,\,\,\,\mathrm{if}\,\,\,|M|>j_1+j_2\\[5pt] j_1+j_2+1-|M|&,\,\,\,\,\,\, \mathrm{if}\,\,\,|j_1-j_2|\leq|M|\leq j_1+j_2\\[5pt] 2\,\mathrm{min}\,(j_1,j_2)+1&,\,\,\,\,\,\, \mathrm{if}\,\,\,0\leq|M|\leq|j_1-j_2| \end{aligned} \right. \end{align} Let $N_J$ be the number of times the representation of spin $J$ appears in the decomposition of the representations of spin $j_1$ and $j_2$. The $n(M)$ basis of eigenvalue $M$ for $J_z$ may also be regarded as coming from the $N_J$ basis $|J,M\rangle$ for the different values of $J$ compatible with that value of $M$, \begin{align} n(M)=\sum_{J\geq|M|} N_J \end{align} By subtracting two such relations, we have \begin{align} N_J=n(J)-n(J+1) =\left\{ \begin{aligned} 1&,\,\,\,\,\,\, \mathrm{if}\,\,\,|j_1-j_2|\leq|M|\leq j_1+j_2\\[5pt] 0&,\,\,\,\,\,\, \mathrm{otherwise} \end{aligned} \right. \end{align} For example, the solution of $n(M)$ for $j_1=\frac{5}{2}$ and $j_2=1$ can be shown figure enter image description here

We have shown that the $(2j_1+1)(2j_2+1)$ vectors with basis $\mathbf{J}^{(1)}$ and $\mathbf{J}^{(2)}$ with $j_1$ and $j_2$ fixed may be reexpressed in terms of vectors $|J,M\rangle$ with \begin{align} J&=|j_1-j_2|,|j_1-j_2|+1,\cdots,j_1+j_2\\ M&=-J,-J+1,\cdots,J \end{align}

thone
  • 1,853