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Take $\hat{V}\psi =V(x)\psi$ with real $V$, and $\hat{T}=-({\hslash }^2/2m)d^2/d{x}^2$. The operator domain matters: use sufficiently smooth wavefunctions for which the following boundary terms vanish at both infinities. A real multiplication operator givesTwo applications of integration by parts giveThus the potential energy and kinetic energy operators obey the stated Hermitian operator identity on this common domain. For $D=d/dx$, one application of integration by parts instead givesThe derivative is anti-Hermitian, rather than Hermitian; the minus sign cannot generally be removed. Multiplication by $-i\hslash$ makes the corresponding momentum operator Hermitian. These integrations establish the requested symmetry identities; full self-adjointness of an unbounded operator additionally requires equality of its domain with its adjoint's domain.

Take the momentum operator $p=-i\hslash d/dx$ and sufficiently regular real $f$. Acting on a test wave function, the commutator is $[p,f]=-i\hslash f^{\prime }$. Expanding the factorized quantum Hamiltonian givesso $V(x)=(f(x{)}^2-\hslash f^{\prime }(x))/(2m)$, which is real.

Set $Q=p-if$. Its zero-mode equation iswith solutionIt satisfies $H{\psi }_0=Q^{†}Q{\psi }_0/(2m)=0$ as a differential equation. It is an actual quantum state only when it is square-integrable. If $f(x)=c{x}^n+\cdots$, $c\ne 0$, its antiderivative has leading term $c{x}^{n+1}/(n+1)$. For even $n$, this leading term has opposite signs at the two ends of the line, so the wave function grows at one end and cannot be normalized. For odd $n$, it has the same sign at both ends. Hence normalizability requires odd $n$, and in fact holds exactly when $n$ is odd and $c>0$. A negative leading coefficient makes it grow at both ends; $f=0$ gives a nonnormalizable constant. These are the normalizable zero mode of a polynomial factorized Hamiltonian conditions.

For a normalized state in the operator domain, integration by parts, with the appropriate vanishing boundary term, givesThus every energy eigenvalue is nonnegative. Equality forces $Q\psi =0$ almost everywhere, whose first-order equation has the one-dimensional solution space above. Whenever its zero mode is normalizable, every energy eigenstate not proportional to ${\psi }_0$ has strictly positive energy. If the formal zero mode is not normalizable, there is no zero-energy eigenstate; the positivity statement still applies to every normalizable eigenstate. This argument concerns eigenvalues and does not assert a strictly positive bound on an arbitrary continuous spectrum.

For the quantum harmonic oscillator, take $f(x)=m\omega x$ with $m,\omega >0$. ThenIts zero mode is normalizable and has no competitor of lower energy. Using the Gaussian integral for its normalization gives the concise answerup to an arbitrary constant phase.

We use $\Delta =\mathrm{div}\nabla$, whose spectrum on a compact manifold is nonpositive; write $P=-\Delta$ for the positive Laplace-Beltrami operator. This convention will also make the heat operator in Question 3 equal to ${\partial }_t-\Delta$.

Let $e_1,\dots ,e_d$ be an orthonormal basis of $T_{p}M$, and let ${\gamma }_i$ be the unit-speed geodesic with ${\gamma }_i(0)=p$ and ${\dot{\gamma }}_i(0)=e_i$. Since a geodesic has vanishing acceleration for the Levi-Civita connection, differentiation twice along it gives the Riemannian Hessian:Taking its metric trace yields the geodesic trace formula for the Laplace-Beltrami operatorThe positive-sign convention $P$ puts a minus sign in front of this sum.

For the unit sphere, take $p\in S^d$ and tangent unit vectors $e_i$ orthogonal to $p$. Its great circle geodesics are ${\gamma }_i(t)=p\cos t+e_i\sin t$. For a smooth ambient function $F$ near the sphere, the ordinary chain rule givesThe ambient orthonormal basis is $e_1,\dots ,e_d,p$. Thus, writing $F_r(p)={\partial }_{r}F(rp){|}_{r=1}$ and similarly for $F_{rr}$,This proves the ambient restriction formula for the spherical Laplacian and shows why ambient derivatives normal to the sphere must be subtracted. The equivalent formula in spherical coordinates is

Let ${\mathcal{P}}_{\ell }$ be the vector space of homogeneous polynomials of degree $\ell$ in $d+1$ variables, and ${\mathcal{H}}_{\ell }=\ker \tilde{\Delta }\cap {\mathcal{P}}_{\ell }$ its harmonic polynomials. If $H\in {\mathcal{H}}_{\ell }$, homogeneous polynomial scaling gives $H(r\omega )=r^{\ell }H(\omega )$. Substitution into the spherical coordinates formula givesThe restrictions are the degree-$\ell$ spherical harmonics. A homogeneous polynomial vanishing on the sphere vanishes on every nonzero ray and hence identically, so restriction is injective on ${\mathcal{H}}_{\ell }$.

We prove the harmonic decomposition of homogeneous polynomials that both counts these eigenfunctions and establishes completeness. For an ambient harmonic homogeneous polynomial $H_m$ of degree $m$ and $j\ge 1$, the spherical coordinates formula givesFor $d\ge 1$ its coefficient is nonzero. Inductively assume homogeneous polynomials of degree $\ell -2$ have been decomposed into sums of $r^{2j}{H}_m$. Apply this decomposition to $\tilde{\Delta }Q$ for $Q\in {\mathcal{P}}_{\ell }$, and lift each summand by multiplying by $r^2$ and dividing by the displayed nonzero coefficient. The resulting $R\in r^2{\mathcal{P}}_{\ell -2}$ satisfies $\tilde{\Delta }R=\tilde{\Delta }Q$, so $Q-R\in {\mathcal{H}}_{\ell }$. The same coefficient formula shows that no nonzero element of $r^2{\mathcal{P}}_{\ell -2}$ can be harmonic. Starting at degrees zero and one therefore proves the direct decompositionSince $\dim {\mathcal{P}}_{\ell }=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{\ell +d}{d}\right)$, the multiplicity iswhere the second term is zero for $\ell <2$.

On $r=1$, iterating the decomposition writes every polynomial restriction as a finite sum of spherical harmonics. The Stone-Weierstrass theorem makes these polynomial restrictions dense in $C(S^d)$, since coordinate functions separate points and constants are included; they are consequently dense in $L^2(S^d)$. Integration by parts makes $P$ symmetric on smooth functions and gives orthogonality between distinct eigenvalues. Normalizing within each finite-dimensional eigenspace gives a complete orthonormal eigenbasis $Y_{\ell a}$. To check the full operator spectrum, let $c_{\ell a}=⟨f,Y_{\ell a}⟩$. For smooth $f$, integration by parts gives the coefficients of $Pf$ as ${\lambda }_{\ell }{c}_{\ell a}$. Therefore finite harmonic partial sums approximate both $f$ and $Pf$ in $L^2$, hence approximate in the graph norm. Conversely every coefficient sequence with ${\sum }_{\ell ,a}{\lambda }_{\ell }^2|c_{\ell a}{|}^2<\infty$ is the graph norm limit of its finite harmonic sums. Thus the closure of $P$ has exactly this operator domain and is the real diagonal self-adjoint operator with entries ${\lambda }_{\ell }=\ell (\ell +d-1)$. If $z$ is not one of these entries, the inverse has entries $({\lambda }_{\ell }-z{)}^{-1}$ and is bounded because ${\lambda }_{\ell }\to \infty$. This proves that there are no missing spectral values. The spectrum of the Laplacian on a sphere iswith the above multiplicities; for $\Delta$, negate every eigenvalue. For example $S^1$ has eigenvalues ${\ell }^2$, with multiplicities one at zero and two for $\ell \ge 1$, and $S^2$ has multiplicity $2\ell +1$. The zero-dimensional sphere consists of two isolated points and has only the zero eigenvalue, with multiplicity two.

For the quadratic variational principle for a symmetric positive operator below, use a symmetric operator $L$ on the real Hilbert space $H$. Strict positive definiteness meansA uniformly positive definite symmetric operator satisfies the stronger coercive operator conditionIn this variational setting, “positive definite” is often used for a symmetric operator with this uniform bound. We will state explicitly where the coercive operator bound is needed. For a bounded linear operator defined on all of $H$, symmetry means that the operator is self-adjoint. For an unbounded operator, positivity is imposed on its operator domain, and the variational formulation is made on its form domain.

Symmetry is essential in a real Hilbert space: positivity of the quadratic expression alone does not imply symmetry. For example, $L=I+K$ with nonzero real skew-symmetric matrix $K$ satisfies $⟨Lv,v⟩=\Vert v{\Vert }^2$, but its quadratic functional has derivative involving $I$, not $I+K$. A positive definite symmetric operator supplies both the positivity and symmetry needed in part (b).

There is a genuine conflict in the printed coefficient assumptions: no uniformly positive coefficient in a zero-boundary Sobolev space exists. A function $a\in H_0^1(\Omega )$ cannot also obey $a\ge a_{-}>0$ almost everywhere. Indeed, the Lipschitz truncation $g(s)=\min (\max (s,0),a_{-})$ has $g(0)=0$, so Lipschitz truncation preserves zero-boundary Sobolev spaces, giving $g(a)\in H_0^1(\Omega )$. But $g(a)$ would be the nonzero constant $a_{-}$. Its zero gradient contradicts the Poincaré inequality in the zero-boundary Sobolev space. Thus the literal coefficient class is empty.

For the meaningful uniformly elliptic problem, take $a\in L^{\infty }(\Omega )$ with $0<a_{-}\le a\le a_{+}$, and impose the Dirichlet boundary condition on the unknown and test functions: $V=H_0^1((0,1{)}^2)$. Additional $H^1$ regularity of $a$ is harmless, but a zero trace for $a$ must be removed. The divergence-form elliptic operator is $L=-\mathrm{div}(a\nabla )$. Integration by parts defines the symmetric bounded bilinear formIn particular,Here $2{\pi }^2$ is the first Dirichlet Laplacian eigenvalue on the unit square; the Poincaré inequality follows, for example, by applying the one-dimensional inequality in each coordinate and adding. Thus $B$ is coercive in the gradient norm on $V$, and the Dirichlet realization of $L$ is a positive definite symmetric operator. On its operator domain, $⟨Lv,v⟩=B(v,v)$.

The required functional and weak equation areBecause $f\in L^2$, the right side is a bounded linear functional by the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality and Poincaré inequality. The Lax-Milgram theorem gives a unique weak solution, and part (b) proves that it uniquely minimizes $I$. These formulas prove the intended conclusion under the repaired coefficient hypothesis; under the literal hypothesis there is no coefficient to which the conclusion can be applied.

Consider the operators on all of $C_0(X)$ or $L^2(\mu )$, extending the displayed positive-function formula linearly. Here $C_0(X)$ is the space of continuous functions vanishing at infinity. The multiplier has modulus at most one, so $\Vert P_{t}f\Vert \le \Vert f\Vert$, and multiplication of exponentials gives $P_{s+t}=P_s{P}_t$ and $P_0=I$. For strong continuity on $C_0(X)$, choose a compact $K$ outside which $|f|$ is small. On $K$ the continuous $k$ is bounded, making $e^{-tk}\to 1$ uniform; outside $K$, $|(e^{-tk}-1)f|\le |f|$. For $L^2(\mu )$, use pointwise convergence and the dominated convergence theorem with bound $|(e^{-tk}-1)f{|}^2\le |f{|}^2$. Thus both are contraction semigroups, even when $k$ is unbounded.

The generator of a multiplication semigroup isIndeed pointwise difference quotients converge to $-kf$. A norm limit therefore forces the displayed domain condition, using an almost-everywhere convergent subsequence for the $L^2$ case. Conversely $|(e^{-tk}-1)/t|\le k$, so the dominated convergence theorem proves the $L^2$ limit when $kf\in L^2$. In $C_0(X)$ write the error as $kf$ times $1-(1-e^{-tk})/(tk)$, with the value at $k=0$ supplied by continuity. That second factor tends uniformly to zero where $k$ is bounded and has modulus at most one; the compact-set and small-tail argument applied to $kf$ proves uniform convergence. To prove directly that $L$ is a closed operator, take $f_n\to f$ and $L{f}_n\to g$. Pointwise limits in $C_0$, or a common almost-everywhere convergent subsequence in $L^2$, give $g=-kf$. Thus $f$ is in the appropriate generator domain and $Lf=g$. In $L^2$ the domain is dense because $f{1}_{\{k\le n\}}\to f$; in $C_0$ compactly supported continuous functions are a dense subspace contained in the domain.

A real multiplication operator on its maximal $L^2$ domain is an unbounded self-adjoint operator. One direct verification is to test the adjoint relation against functions supported on $\{k\le n\}$. If $h$ is in the adjoint operator domain with representing vector $g$, those tests force $g=-kh$ on each such set, hence $kh\in L^2$. The converse follows by integration. On the sigma-finite measure spaces used below, the spectrum of a real multiplication operator is its essential range; spectral values are detected by unit vectors supported where the multiplier is arbitrarily close to that value, while outside the essential range its reciprocal is a bounded resolvent multiplier.

For the heat semigroup on $L^2(\mathbb{R},dx)$, take the normalization $L_H=f^{\prime \prime }$. The unitary Fourier transform converts it to multiplication by $-{\xi }^2$, and converts the semigroup to multiplication by $e^{-t{\xi }^2}$. ConsequentlyThe Sobolev space domain is exactly $\{f:{\xi }^2\hat{f}\in L^2\}$. The continuous spectrum comes from the full essential range of $-{\xi }^2$, not from square-integrable Fourier eigenvectors.

For the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck semigroup on standard Gaussian measure, the normalized Probabilists' Hermite polynomials $h_n={\mathrm{He}}_n/\sqrt{n!}$ form an orthonormal basis. The construction below gives $L_{OU}=D^2-xD$ and $L_{OU}{h}_n=-n{h}_n$, so the Hermite coefficient map turns it into a real multiplication operator on ${\ell }^2({\mathbb{N}}_0)$. ThereforeFinally, the heat semigroup on the whole real line has no positive spectral gap, whereas the standard Ornstein-Uhlenbeck semigroup has gap one. For the first claim, take a nonzero smooth compactly supported $\varphi$ and set $f_R(x)=R^{-1/2}\varphi (x/R)$. Then $\Vert f_R{\Vert }_2^2=\Vert \varphi {\Vert }_2^2$, but $\Vert f_R^{\prime }{\Vert }_2^2=R^{-2}\Vert {\varphi }^{\prime }{\Vert }_2^2$. This disproves a uniform whole-line Poincaré inequality $\Vert f{\Vert }_2^2\le C\Vert f^{\prime }{\Vert }_2^2$; one can also choose $\int \varphi =0$. Lebesgue measure here is infinite, so it has no normalized probability mean to subtract. For Gaussian measure, the Hermite expansion instead gives the sharp Gaussian Poincaré inequalityEquality holds for affine functions. The identity on the right is interpreted on the energy-form domain, which is larger than the full operator domain.

For a densely defined operator $A$ on a complex Hilbert space, unbounded self-adjointness means equality $A=A^{\ast }$ including equality of the operator domains. Symmetry alone asserts only $A\subseteq A^{\ast }$ and is insufficient. Use an inner product linear in its first argument. If $\mathrm{Im}z\ne 0$, symmetry givesThus $A-z$ is bounded below. Since $A$ is closed, its range is closed; its orthogonal complement is $\ker (A^{\ast }-\overline{z})=\ker (A-\overline{z})=0$, so the range is also dense and therefore all of $H$. The inverse is bounded by $|\mathrm{Im}z{|}^{-1}$. The nonreal resolvent estimate for a self-adjoint operator proves $\sigma (A)\subseteq \mathbb{R}$.

For bounded self-adjoint $T$, its numerical range of an operator and numerical radius areEvery number in $W(T)$ is real. If $z\notin \overline{W(T)}$, its distance $\delta$ from that closed set is positive, and $\Vert (T-z)u\Vert \ge \delta \Vert u\Vert$. The same bound applies to $T-\overline{z}$, so the range is dense as well as closed and $T-z$ has a bounded inverse. Hence the numerical-range spectral enclosure isThe closure is necessary in infinite dimension: the endpoints of the numerical range need not themselves be attained.

Put $\beta =\sup W(T)$ and $B=\beta I-T$, a bounded positive semidefinite operator. Choose unit vectors $u_n$ with $⟨B{u}_n,u_n⟩\to 0$. The Cauchy-Schwarz inequality for the positive form $⟨B\cdot ,\cdot ⟩$ impliesTherefore $\beta$ is an approximate eigenvalue. Apply the same argument to $T-\alpha I$, where $\alpha =\inf W(T)$, to get the other endpoint. This proves the numerical-range endpoint approximate-eigenvalue theorem. Each endpoint is in the spectrum: a bounded inverse would forbid unit vectors with vanishing residual.

If an unbounded self-adjoint operator $A$ is positive semidefinite, then for every real $z<0$, $\Vert (A-z)u\Vert \ge (-z)\Vert u\Vert$. The range argument above again proves invertibility, excluding negative values from the spectrum. For the converse, suppose $\sigma (A)\subseteq [0,\infty )$. Its resolvent operator $R=(I+A{)}^{-1}$ is bounded and self-adjoint. The resolvent spectral mapping identity puts $\sigma (R)\subseteq [0,1]$: for $w\ne 0$, the relevant spectral parameter of $A$ is $1/w-1$, and nonreal values are excluded by self-adjointness. By the endpoint result just proved, $W(R)\subseteq [0,1]$. Positive-form Cauchy-Schwarz inequality then givesFor $u=Rf\in D(A)$ this yields $⟨Au,u⟩=⟨f-Rf,Rf⟩\ge 0$. Thus the spectral positivity criterion for a self-adjoint operator isThis resolvent proof uses the bounded numerical-range result to handle the full unbounded domain.

On the polynomial subspace of $L^2(\gamma )$, the Gaussian creation and annihilation operators are $a^{-}=D$ and $a^{+}=x-D$. Gaussian integration by parts makes them adjoints there and gives $[a^{-},a^{+}]=I$. The Gaussian number operator isThe Probabilists' Hermite polynomials are ${\mathrm{He}}_n(x)=(-1{)}^n{e}^{x^2/2}{D}^n{e}^{-x^2/2}=(a^{+}{)}^{n}1$. Their generating function is $e^{sx-s^2/2}={\sum }_n{\mathrm{He}}_n(x)s^n/n!$, giving $D{\mathrm{He}}_n=n{\mathrm{He}}_{n-1}$. The commutator also yieldsThe orthogonality follows by repeated integration by parts; the leading coefficient is one, so these polynomials span every polynomial. By the allowed density assumption $h_n={\mathrm{He}}_n/\sqrt{n!}$ is an orthonormal basis. Define the closed number operator by $N\sum c_n{h}_n=\sum n{c}_n{h}_n$ on $\sum n^2|c_n{|}^2<\infty$. This diagonal multiplication operator is self-adjoint and positive semidefinite; polynomial truncations show it is the closure of the polynomial operator.

The Ornstein-Uhlenbeck semigroup is $P_t=e^{-tN}$, or $P_{t}f={\sum }_n{e}^{-nt}{c}_n{h}_n$. It also has the Mehler formula for the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck semigroupTo verify the formula, apply its right side to $e^{sx-s^2/2}$: the Gaussian moment-generating function makes the result $e^{s{e}^{-t}x-s^2{e}^{-2t}/2}$, proving the eigenvalue identity on every Hermite polynomial. Positivity and invariance of Gaussian measure give $L^2$ contraction by Jensen inequality, so polynomial density extends the equality to all $L^2(\gamma )$. The coefficient expansion givesFor continuously differentiable $f$ with bounded derivative, differentiate the Mehler expectation by the dominated convergence theorem to get the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck gradient commutation identityThe same identity extends to the Gaussian Sobolev form domain. Mehler's formula also gives pointwise convergence to the Gaussian mean for such $f$, since bounded derivative permits at most linear growth.

The Gaussian Dirichlet energy is the energy form of $N$:For polynomials this follows from $N=(a^{-}{)}^{\ast }{a}^{-}$, and closure extends it to the form domain. For the given continuously differentiable $f$, Gaussian integration by parts yields $⟨f^{\prime },h_{n-1}⟩=\sqrt{n}{c}_n$, so Parseval identity proves the derivative-energy equality directly. Bounded derivative puts $f$ in the Gaussian Sobolev space, hence in that form domain; it need not be in the full operator domain, so $⟨f,Nf⟩$ is not always a legitimate initial definition.

Use the entropy functional ${\mathrm{Ent}}_{\gamma }(h)=\int h\log hd\gamma -(\int hd\gamma )\log \int hd\gamma$. Begin with bounded smooth $h>0$ bounded away from zero, and put $h_t=P_{t}h$. Invariance and Gaussian integration by parts give the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck entropy dissipation identityThe gradient identity and the permitted weighted Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, applied with weight $h$, implyThe entropy tends to zero as $t\to \infty$ by Mehler's formula and bounded convergence. Integrating in time and using invariance yields ${\mathrm{Ent}}_{\gamma }(h)\le \frac{1}{2}\int |h^{\prime }{|}^2/hd\gamma$. Set $h=f^2$ to obtain the sharp Gaussian logarithmic Sobolev inequalityFor the stated possibly unbounded $f$, apply the argument to smooth positive clipped approximations with a common positive lower bound and uniformly bounded derivatives. They can converge pointwise together with their derivatives and have a common linear-growth bound. Since Gaussian measure integrates every polynomial moment, dominated convergence theorem passes both the entropy and the derivative energy to the limit. This also justifies use of the supplied inequality when $2f{f}^{\prime }$ itself is unbounded. The normalization $\Vert f{\Vert }_1=1$ concerns $f$, and does not imply $\int f^{2}d\gamma =1$; the second term in the entropy definition must be retained.

Write $B=-A=-{\partial }_x^2+1+x^2$. Smooth compactly supported functions lie in $D(A)$ and are dense in L2 space, so $A$ is densely defined.

For $\lambda >0$, use the formon the one-dimensional harmonic oscillator form domain $X$. It is bounded and coercive in the $X$ norm. The Lax-Milgram theorem gives a unique $u\in X$ satisfying $a_{\lambda }(u,v)=⟨g,v⟩$ for every $v\in X$. Thus $-u^{\prime \prime }+(1+\lambda +x^2)u=g$ in distributions.

We must verify the full specified operator domain, not just the form domain. The equation first gives $u\in H_{\mathrm{loc}}^2$. For compactly supported $H^2$ functions, integration by parts gives the graph estimate for the harmonic oscillator, obtained fromApply this to $v={\chi }_{R}u$, with ${\chi }_R=1$ on $[-R,R]$, supported in $[-2R,2R]$, and derivatives bounded by $C/R$ and $C/R^2$. Its right-hand source is ${\chi }_{R}g-2{\chi }_R^{\prime }{u}^{\prime }-{\chi }_R^{\prime \prime }u$, uniformly bounded in L2 space. The estimate and the Fatou lemma give $x^{2}u\in L^2$; the original equation then gives $u^{\prime \prime }\in L^2$, and hence $u\in H^2$. Thus $u\in D(A)$, proving that $\lambda -A$ is onto. The energy identity proves injectivity and the resolvent of the shifted harmonic oscillator estimateTo prove closedness, suppose $u_n\to u$ and $A{u}_n\to v$ in L2 space. For one fixed $\lambda >0$,Therefore $u$ belongs to the range of the resolvent, namely $D(A)$, and $Au=v$.

All hypotheses of the Hille-Yosida theorem now hold; the resolvent bound is stronger than $1/\lambda$. Let $S(t)$ be its contraction semigroup. The exponentially shifted semigrouphas generator $A+I={\partial }_x^2-x^2$. It is continuous in L2 space, takes the initial value ${\psi }_0$, and satisfies $\boxed{\Vert \psi (t){\Vert }_2\le e^t\Vert {\psi }_0{\Vert }_2}$. For ${\psi }_0\in D(A)$, its time derivative exists in L2 space and equals $(A+I)\psi (t)$, so the equation holds as a strong L2 space solution. For general initial data it is the semigroup solution, without an unproved pointwise differentiability claim.

A Hermitian operator $A$ satisfies $⟨\phi ,A\psi ⟩=⟨A\phi ,\psi ⟩$ on its operator domain. HereTwo integration by parts operations, together with the boundary conditions in the Hamiltonian domain, show that the kinetic term is Hermitian; multiplication by the real function $V$ is Hermitian as well. Thus $H$ is Hermitian.

For a time-independent operator $A$, the Schrödinger equation and its adjoint give the Ehrenfest theoremUsing the canonical commutation relation $[x,p]=i\hslash$,Consequently

Assume a complete orthonormal eigenbasis and a self-adjoint operator bounded below, with the trial state in its operator domain or associated energy-form domain. The expansion and orthogonality giveConsequentlyIt is a weighted average of eigenvalues, all at least $E_0$. This is the Rayleigh-Ritz variational principle; equality holds precisely when the trial state lies in the ground-state subspace. A continuous part of the spectrum would require the corresponding spectral integral in place of part of the sum.

Assume $H$ is self-adjoint on its specified operator domain, and the admissible variations preserve that domain and any boundary conditions, so no boundary terms spoil self-adjointness. Let $N=⟨\varphi ,\varphi ⟩>0$. The first variation of the Rayleigh quotient isAt $\varphi ={\psi }_n$, the residual vanishes, so $\boxed{\delta F[{\psi }_n]=0}$. More explicitly, for a normalized ${\psi }_n$ and $\varphi ={\psi }_n+\eta$,For a fixed admissible direction scaled by a small parameter, the change is second order. This is stationarity, and is not necessarily a minimum for an excited state.

Conversely, vanishing first variation for every admissible complex direction yields the stationary equationAt the original stationary point, this is $(H-F[{\psi }_n]){\psi }_n=0$. The printed equation with an arbitrary perturbed $\varphi$ in the final factor is not generally true. Taking $\varphi ={\psi }_n+ϵ{\psi }_m$ with $E_m\ne E_n$ gives $(H-E_n)\varphi =ϵ(E_m-E_n){\psi }_m\ne 0$, even though the first-order change in $F$ is zero. Thus the valid claim is the stationary equation at the extremal state, not an exact eigenvalue equation for every variation.

For an eigenfunction in the operator domain, $H{\psi }_n=E_n{\psi }_n$. Substitution into the Rayleigh quotient givesThe cancellation only needs a finite nonzero norm; orthonormalization makes both denominator and norm equal to one.

Take $\gamma >0$ and set $A=\pi /2$. The Rayleigh quotient of the trial for the quantum harmonic oscillator isIts denominator is $\pi /(2\gamma )$. The kinetic numerator is ${\gamma }^2$ times that denominator. For the remaining integral, put $t=\gamma x$ and useobtained from ${\cos }^{2}t=(1+\cos 2t)/2$ and integration by parts. Thus the compact cosine trial bound for the quantum harmonic oscillator isDifferentiation gives $R^{\prime }=2\gamma -({\pi }^2-6)/(6{\gamma }^3)$, so the minimizing parameter satisfiesThe quotient tends to infinity at either end of $\gamma >0$, and the two positive terms are equal at this stationary point, proving it is the global minimum. ThereforeFor comparison, the exact ground state has value $1$. The trial is admissible for the energy quadratic form: it is continuous, has compact support, and its weak derivative is square-integrable. Its first derivative jumps at the support endpoints, so it need not belong to the smaller twice-differentiable operator domain; this does not invalidate the Rayleigh-Ritz variational principle bound.

The canonical commutation relation is $[p_x,x]=-i\hslash I$. Applying the commutator product rule on a common operator domain,Equivalently, applying both sides to a twice differentiable test function gives $-{\hslash }^2[(xf{)}^{\prime \prime }-x{f}^{\prime \prime }]=-2{\hslash }^2{f}^{\prime }$, the same result.

Time dependence in quantum mechanics describes how a prepared quantum state changes and thereby changes the probabilities of later measurements. For an isolated system, the Schrödinger picture assigns this evolution to a state vector $|\psi (t)⟩$, governed by the Time-dependent Schrödinger equationThe Hamiltonian is a self-adjoint operator; it has units of energy, while $\hslash$ has units of action, so $\hat{H}/\hslash$ has units of inverse time. For a particle with potential energy $V(\mathbf{r},t)$, this becomesGiven a suitable initial wavefunction and the physical boundary conditions, this first-order equation determines its subsequent propagation. Its linearity means that the evolution of a quantum superposition is the corresponding quantum superposition of evolved states.

For a real potential energy, this equation and its complex conjugate imply the local continuity equationHere $\rho$ is the probability density and $\mathbf{j}$ the probability current. Vanishing net boundary flux preserves wavefunction normalization, as required by the Born rule.

The time-evolution operator packages the solution for every initial state:Because ${\hat{H}}^{†}=\hat{H}$, differentiation givesTherefore $U^{†}U=I$: this is unitary time evolution, preserving inner products and all state norms. It is reversible, with $U(t,t_0{)}^{-1}=U(t_0,t)=U(t,t_0{)}^{†}$, and obeys the composition law $U(t_2,t_0)=U(t_2,t_1)U(t_1,t_0)$.