• The two-body multipole problem of electrodynamics

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    • Keywords

       

      Multipole expansion; multipole moments; irreducible spherical tensors; two-body scalar and vector potentials; spin-orbit interaction; electric dipole-magnetic dipole interaction

    • Abstract

       

      A 2-body system composed of two objects having arbitrary distributions of charge and current is discussed. An expression for the velocity dependent potential between these two objects has been obtained in the non-relativistic approximation. This potential consists of two parts viz. a velocity independent scalar potential Φeff and another part which is linearly dependent on the relative velocity between the objects. The second part naturally suggests a vector potential Aeff. The potentials have been expanded into multipole terms. It has been found that Φeff is a sum of two components viz. ΦEE and ΦMM such that each multipole term in ΦEE represents an interaction between the electric multipoles of the two systems, each term in ΦMM represents an interaction between their magnetic multipoles whereas each term in Aeff represents an interaction between an electric multipole of one and a magnetic multipole of the other. The results have been applied to the interaction between an electric dipole and a magnetic dipole. The symmetry among the multipole terms in Aeff suggests vanishing vector potential between two identical objects. A corollary of this appears to be absence of spin orbit interaction between two identical particles in the same spin state.

    • Author Affiliations

       

      Somnath Datta1

      1. Regional College of Education, National Council of Educational Research and Training, Mysore - 570 006, India
    • Dates

       
  • Pramana – Journal of Physics | News

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