Introduction

Many students find time-dependent quantum mechanics the most interesting and understandable part of quantum mechanics. However, standard courses in quantum mechanics devote little attention to this perspective, and its relationship to the rest of the syllabus is disjointed. This book is an entirely original manifesto that develops quantum mechanics from beginning to end from the time-dependent viewpoint.

There are several compelling reasons to increase the fraction of time-dependent quantum mechanics in the standard curriculum. The time-dependent viewpoint is dynamic and very visual. It can be conveyed in an exciting and effective way to advanced undergraduates as well as graduate students. Many of the conceptual difficulties of beginning students of quantum mechanics disappear once they grasp the time dependent approach. To fully exploit the dynamic and visual character of this approach, a full library of computer animations has been designed to supplement the text of the book.

In addition to its pedagogical appeal, the time-dependent perspective provides the simplest and most natural interpretation of many of the frontier experiments in modern Chemical Physics --- from femtochemistry to transition state spectroscopy, from dynamic absorption to resonance Raman spectroscopy, from coherent control to photodissociation to reactive scattering. All these applications are treated in a unified way in this book, using a small set of conceptual building blocks.

The book is targeted for three audiences:

• Advanced undergraduates in Physics and Chemistry.
• Graduate students in Chemical Physics and Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics.
• Researchers, both theoretical and experimental, in the above fields.