A discrete-velocity, stationary Wigner equation

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the one-dimensional stationary linear Wigner equation, a kinetic formulation of quantum mechanics. Specifically, we analyze the well-posedness of the boundary value problem on a slab of the phase space with given inflow data for a discrete-velocity model. We find that the problem is uniquely solvable if zero is not a discrete velocity. Otherwise one obtains a differential-algebraic equation of index 2 and, hence, the inflow data make the system overdetermined. (C) 2000 American Institute of Physics. [S0022-2488(00)00112-2].