 Continuum limit of a harmonic chain

At wavelengths much longer than the lattice spacing, $u_{j+1}-u_j\simeq a{\partial }_{x}u$ gives $L=\int dx[\rho ({\partial }_{t}u{)}^2-K({\partial }_{x}u{)}^2]/2$. The field obeys a wave equation with sound speed $v=\sqrt{K/\rho }$. Its conjugate momentum density is $\Pi =\rho {\partial }_{t}u$ and canonical quantization gives $[u(x),\Pi (x^{\prime })]=i\hslash \delta (x-x^{\prime })$. The lattice remains the ultraviolet cutoff of this long-wave theory.