Supersymmetry and the Hartmann Potential of Theoretical Chemistry

Abstract

The ring-shaped Hartmann potential $ V = \eta \sigma^{2} \epsilon_{0} \left( \frac{2 a_{0}}{r} - \frac{\eta a_{0}^{2}}{r^{2} sin^{2} \theta} \right) $ was introduced in quantum chemistry to describe ring-shaped molecules like benzene. In this article, the supersymmetric features of the Hartmann potential are discussed. We first review the results of a previous paper in which we rederived the eigenvalues and radial eigenfunctions of the Hartmann potential using a formulation of one-dimensional supersymmetric quantum mechanics (SUSYQM) on the half-line $\left[ 0, \infty \right)$. A reformulation of SUSYQM in the full line $\left( -\infty, \infty \right)$ is subsequently developed. It is found that the second formulation makes a connection between states having the same quantum number $L$ but different values of $\eta \sigma^{2}$ and quantum number $N$. This is in contrast to the first formulation, which relates states with identical values of the quantum number $N$ and $\eta \sigma^{2}$ but different values of the quantum number $L$.