Dynamics of Totally Constrained Systems II. Quantum Theory

Abstract

In this paper a new formulation of quantum dynamics of totally constrained systems is developed, in which physical quantities representing time are included as observables. In this formulation the hamiltonian constraints are imposed on a relative probability amplitude functional $\Psi$ which determines the relative probability for each state to be observed, instead of on the state vectors as in the conventional Dirac quantization. This leads to a foliation of the state space by linear manifolds on each of which $\Psi$ is constant, and dynamics is described as linear mappings among acausal subspaces which are transversal to these linear manifolds. This is a quantum analogue of the classical statistical dynamics of totally constrained systems developed in the previous paper. It is shown that if the von Neumann algebra $\C$ generated by the constant of motion is of type I, $\Psi$ can be consistently normalizable on the acausal subspaces on which a factor subalgebra of $\C$ is represented irreducibly, and the mappings among these acausal subspaces are conformal. How the formulation works is illustrated by simple totally constrained systems with a single constraint such as the parametrized quantum mechanics, a relativistic free particle in Minkowski and curved spacetimes, and a simple minisuperspace model. It is pointed out that the inner product of the relative probability amplitudes induced from the original Hilbert space picks up a special decomposition of the wave functions to the positive and the negative frequency modes.