Coherent states: Theory and some applications

Abstract

In this review, a general algorithm for constructing coherent states of dynamical groups for a given quantum physical system is presented. The result is that, for a given dynamical group, the coherent states are isomorphic to a coset space of group geometrical space. Thus the topological and algebraic structure of the coherent states as well as the associated dynamical system can be extensively discussed. In addition, a quantum-mechanical phase-space representation is constructed via the coherent-state theory. Several useful methods for employing the coherent states to study the physical phenomena of quantum-dynamic systems, such as the path integral, variational principle, classical limit, and thermodynamic limit of quantum mechanics, are described.