Paper 1, Section II, C
Part IB, 2011
For a quantum mechanical particle moving freely on a circle of length , the wavefunction satisfies the Schrödinger equation
on the interval , and also the periodicity conditions , and . Find the allowed energy levels of the particle, and their degeneracies.
The current is defined as
where is a normalized state. Write down the general normalized state of the particle when it has energy , and show that in any such state the current is independent of and . Find a state with this energy for which the current has its maximum positive value, and find a state with this energy for which the current vanishes.