Relativistic electron wave packets carrying angular momentum

Abstract

There are important differences between the nonrelativistic and relativistic description of electron beams. The orbital angular momentum quantum number cannot be used to specify the wave functions in the relativistic case. In this Letter we introduce analytic solutions of the Dirac equation in the form of exponential wave packets and we argue that they properly describe relativistic electron beams carrying angular momentum.

Editors' Suggestion Commented on in Viewpoint

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• Mode Decomposed Chiral Magnetic Effect and Rotating Fermions
• Construction of Dirac spinors for electron vortex beams in background electromagnetic fields
• On Small Beams with Large Topological Charge II: Photons, Electrons and Gravitational Waves
• Fractional Angular Momenta, Gouy and Berry phases in Relativistic Bateman-Hillion-Gaussian Beams of Electrons
• Heisenberg uncertainty relation for relativistic electrons
• Scattering of a twisted electron wavepacket by a finite laser pulse
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• High Harmonic Generation with Twisted Electrons
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• Dynamics of relativistic vortex electrons in external laser fields
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• Comment on "Fractional Angular Momenta, Gouy and Berry Phases in Relativistic Bateman-Hillion-Gaussian Beams of Electrons" [arXiv:1812.04957]