Mathematical study of scattering resonances (Q523628)

The paper presents a detailed review of the mathematical theory of resonances in quantum-mechanical scattering. The article also includes an overview of modern physical applications, such as, for instance, the problem of scattering of gravity waves. Although the scattering is, in principle, a dynamical problem, the review is focused on the approach to the resonances which uses the meromorphic continuation of poles of the Greens's functions or scattering matrices. The review starts with the consideration of well-known results in the one-dimensional geometry, including those obtained with the help of the semi-classical approximation. Then, more sophisticated findings are reported for three-dimensional settings with bounded compactly supported scattering potentials, also using the technique of the meromorphic continuation of the respective Green's functions. In addition, the relation of the scattering-resonance theory to power spectra of correlation functions in chaotic dynamics (known as Pollicot-Ruelle resonances) is also included in the present review.