Effective potentials generated by field interaction in the quasi-classical limit (Q1693291)

The paper addresses formal and mathematically rigorous aspects of the semiclassical limit for the quantum model of the interaction of a finite number of nonrelativistic particles with a quantum electromagnetic or acoustic field. The semiclassical limit is considered for the field. The underlying model includes several physically relevant settings, such as the Fröhlich polaron Hamiltonian, which describes the interaction of electrons with a phonon field in a crystalline medium. The main result reported in the paper is that, in the semiclassical limit for the field, the effective quantum Hamiltonian for the system of particles, interacting with the field, converges to a particular form, which, in particular, includes an additional potential of the inter-particle interaction, which depends on a particular state of the field in which the particles are embedded. The additional potential is explicitly derived for a large class of field states, being trapping in this case. It is also proven that, in the same semiclassical limit, the energy of the system's ground state converges to an expression determined by a variational principle, which depends on the state of the field in the classical limit.