Low-lying spectra in anharmonic three-body oscillators with a strong short-range repulsion

Abstract

Three-body Schroedinger equation is studied in one dimension. Its two-body interactions are assumed composed of the long-range attraction (dominated by the L-th-power potential) in superposition with a short-range repulsion (dominated by the (-K)-th-power core) plus further subdominant power-law components if necessary. This unsolvable and non-separable generalization of Calogero model (which is a separable and solvable exception at L = K = 2) is presented in polar Jacobi coordinates. We derive a set of trigonometric identities for the potentials which generalizes the well known K=2 identity of Calogero to all integers. This enables us to write down the related partial differential Schroedinger equation in an amazingly compact form. As a consequence, we are able to show that all these models become separable and solvable in the limit of strong repulsion.