Chapter 9: Classical Descriptions of Quantum Tunneling

At the beginning of Chapter 2 we defined tunneling as a quantal process which is forbidden by the laws of classical dynamics. Nonetheless we can describe the tunneling phenomena either partially, or completely in terms of the laws of classical dynamics provided that we replace the simple quantal system by a complicated interacting system. After solving and simplifying the result, we find a set of classical laws of motion derivable from a classical Hamiltonian function, however the interaction is not simple - it no longer looks like a potential barrier, and it also depends on the Planck's constant ħ [1]–[5]…