PHOTON SCATTERING

69

line of Equation (2.77) comes from the fact that the contributions from the two terms discussed above are equal. Because the system A cannot change in elastic scattering we have B A = BA . The energies EA and EB are the eigenvalues of H0 , the Hamiltonian for the systems A and B.The expression is of order e2 . We now consider the second order contribution of the A p term. We start with the equation for c (2) Equation (1.92) f f (t) = i 2 c
m (2) i(Ef Em )t c(1) m f H1 m e

(2.78)
(1)

This second order equation requires a rst order expression for cm for which we use Equation (1.91) where we substitute m for f c (1) m (t) = i
n i(Em En )t c(0) n m H1 n e

(2.79)

As in Section 1.3 we assume that the system is in the state i at some time t1 (0) (0) in the past. Then all cn (t1 ) = 0 except for ci (t1 ) = 1, see the discussion below Equation (1.93) in Section 1.3. We get from Equation (2.79)
i(Em Ei )t c (1) m (t) = i m H1 i e

(2.80)

We integrate Equation (2.80) from t1 to t to get c(1) m (t) = i

t t1

dt m H1 i ei(Em Ei )t

(2.81)

where we have introduced a new integration variable t . Of course t1 t t. Substitution of Equation (2.81) in Equation (2.78) gives 2 c f (t) = (i)2
(2) t

dt
t1 m

f H1 m m H1 i ei(Ef Em )t ei(Em Ei )t
2 t

= (i)2

e m

dt
t1 I

B; k , A(x, t) p I (2.82)

I A(x , t ) p A; k, ei(EB EI )t ei(EI EA )t

We have replaced m by I where I stands for intermediate. The name is appropriate because the operator product A(x , t ) p converts the state A; k, to the state I which in turn is converted by the operator product A(x, t) p to the state B; k , . Thus the state I is truly intermediate; it is only reached in passing from A; k, to B; k , .