Classical and quantum harmonic oscillators subject to a time dependent force

Abstract

In this work we address the problem of the quantization of a simple harmonic oscillator that is perturbed by a time dependent force. The approach consists of removing the perturbation by a canonical change of coordinates. Since the quantization procedure uses the classical Hamiltonian formalism as staring point, the change of variables is carried out using canonical transformations, and to transform between the quantized systems the canonical transformation is implemented as a unitary transformation mapping the states of the perturbed and unperturbed system onto each other.