CONTINUOUS SYMMETRY OPERATORS

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where we used Equation (3.12) for the rst equality, Equation (3.9) for the second equality, Equation (3.8) for the fourth equality, and Equation (3.9) for the last equality. This relation must hold for any ket x + ax so we have the operator equation 1 = X ax 1 (3.14) Tx XTx We dene exp(A), the exponentiation of the operator A, by its Taylor series expansion 1 3 2 eA = 1 + A + 1 (3.15) 2A + 6A + It follows from this denition that the inverse operator of exp(A) is exp(A). Without loss of generality we can write the operator Tx in the form of an exponential (3.16) Tx = eiax Px where Px is an operator yet to be determined. The usefulness of writing Tx in the form Equation (3.16) will become clear soon. For the moment we note that Equation (3.16) gives Tx = 1 for ax = 0, as expected because if ax = 0 the kets x + ax and x should be equal. The imaginary unit i in the exponent in Equation (3.16) together with the fact that Tx is unitary, see Equation (3.11), means that the operator Px is Hermitian (show this) and that its eigenvalues, if any, will be real and observable. This remedies the fact that the eigenvalues of Tx are not observable. To identify the operator Px in Equation (3.16) we consider the case of an innitely small ax . We expand Equation (3.16) in powers of ax and substitute the result in Equation (3.14). Keeping terms to order a1 we get (1 iax Px )X(1 + iax P ) = X ax 1 or iPx X iXPx = 1 or [Px , X] = 1/i. We conclude that the unknown operator Px introduced in Equation (3.16) is the x-component of the momentum operator P. Had we not introduced the minus sign in Equation (3.16) we would have concluded that the unknown operator Px was the negative of the momentum operator and we would be led to introduce the minus sign. If Tx is a symmetry operator it must commute with the Hamiltonian, see Equation (3.5). It is easy to show using Equation (3.15) that if Tx commutes with H that Px also commutes with H. Therefore Px and H share the same eigenkets (or in the case of degeneracy, shared eigenkets can be constructed). Thus the eigenvalues of Px and the energy E of the physical system are simultaneously observable and the eigenvalues of Px are conserved. Thus we have derived conservation of the x component of the momentum P from the symmetry of the physical system under translations in the x direction. In general we may write a continuous unitary operator U as U = eiG (3.17)