Discretized path-integral representation partition functions

Here we review well-known principles of quantum statistical mechanics as necessary to develop a path-integral representation of the partition function. The equations of quantum statistical mechanics are, like so many equations, easy to write down and difficult to implement (at least, for interesting systems). Our purpose here is not to solve these equations but rather to write them down as integrals over configuration space. These integrals can be seen to have a form that is isomorphic to the discretized path-integral representation of the kernel developed in the previous section. 

Path integrals are particularly useful for describing the quantum mechanics of an equilibrium system because the canonical distribution for a single quantum particle in the path integral picture becomes isomorphic with that for a classical ring polymer of quasiparticles [17-19, 26] (cf. Fig. 1). In the discretized path-integral representation, the partition function for a quantum particle is given by the expression... 

In the so-called primitive representation of the discretized path-integral approach [141], the canonical partition function for finite P has the form... 

By comparing analogous terms in ( , x) and Q, we see that we can think of the partition function as a path integral over periodic orbits that recur in a complex time interval equal to i s flh/i = — ifih. There is no claim here that the closed paths used to generate Q correspond to actual quantum dynamics, but simply that there is an isomorphism. We therefore can refer to the equation above as the discretized path-integral (DPI) representation of the partition function. Using Feynman s notation, we have in the infinite-P limit... 

Equilibrium properties can be determined from the partition function Zq and this quantity can, in turn, be computed using Feynman s path integral approach to quantum mechanics in imaginary time [86]. In this representation of quantum mechanics, quantum particles are mapped onto closed paths r(f) in imaginary time f, 0 f )8ft. The path integral expression for the canonical partition function of a quantum particle is given by the P 00 limit of the quantum path discretized into P segments. 

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