L2 series solutions of the Dirac equation for power-law potentials at rest mass energy

Abstract

We obtain solutions of the three dimensional Dirac equation for radial power-law potentials at rest mass energy as an infinite series of square integrable functions. These are written in terms of the confluent hypergeometric function and chosen such that the matrix representation of the Dirac operator is tridiagonal. The "wave equation" results in a three-term recursion relation for the expansion coefficients of the spinor wavefunction which is solved in terms of orthogonal polynomials. These are modified versions of the Meixner-Pollaczek polynomials and of the continuous dual Hahn polynomials. The choice depends on the values of the angular momentum and the power of the potential.