Fundamental length in quantum theories with PT-symmetric Hamiltonians II: The case of quantum graphs

Abstract

Manifestly non-Hermitian quantum graphs with real spectra are introduced and shown tractable as a new class of phenomenological models with several appealing descriptive properties. For illustrative purposes, just equilateral star-graphs are considered here in detail, with non-Hermiticities introduced by interactions attached to the vertices. The facilitated feasibility of the analysis of their spectra is achieved via their systematic approximative Runge-Kutta-inspired reduction to star-shaped discrete lattices. The resulting bound-state spectra are found real in a discretization-independent interval of couplings. This conclusion is reinterpreted as the existence of a hidden Hermiticity of our models, i.e., as the standard and manifest Hermiticity of the underlying Hamiltonian in one of less usual, {\em ad hoc} representations ${\mathcal{H}}_j$ of the Hilbert space of states in which the inner product is local (at $j=0$) or increasingly nonlocal (at $j=1,2,...$). Explicit examples of these (of course, Hamiltonian-dependent) hermitizing inner products are offered in closed form. In this way each initial quantum graph is assigned a menu of optional, non-equivalent standard probabilistic interpretations exhibiting a controlled, tunable nonlocality.

33 pp., 6 figures

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