Angular momentum nonconservation and conservation in quasiclassical Positronium

Abstract

It is shown that due to Thomas precession, angular momentum is not generally a constant of the motion in a quasiclassical model of the Positronium atom consisting of circular-orbiting point charges with intrinsic spin and associated magnetic moment. Despite absence of externally-applied torque, angular momentum is a constant of the motion only if the electron and positron intrinsic angular momentum vector components perpendicular to the orbital angular momentum are antiparallel and of equal magnitude.

arXiv comment34 pages

References in corpus (4)

• Reply to "the Comment on `Gauge Invariance and kT-Factorization of Exclusive Processes'"
• Classical Electron Theory and Conservation Laws
• Regarding Llewellyn Thomas's paper of 1927 and the "hidden momentum" of a magnetic dipole in an electric field
• On the influence of hidden momentum and hidden energy in the classical analysis of spin-orbit coupling in hydrogenlike atoms