Quantum particle on the surface of a spherocylindrical capsule

Abstract

A spinless nonrelativistic quantum particle on the curved surface of a homogeneous spherocylindrical capsule is considered. We apply Costa's formalism to solve the Schr\"{o}dinger equation with only a confined potential forcing the particle to remain on the surface and be free to move. It is shown that while a quantum particle with zero tangential/local energy can exist on the surface of a spherical shell with an arbitrary radius, it exists on a spherocylinder capsule only with a quantized length-to-radius ratio. In other words, if and only if the length-to-radius ratio of the capsule is an even multiplication of $\pi $, the wave function on the surface interferes with itself constructively such that the wave function survives. This hypothetical phenomenon may lead to applications in nanoscale measurements.