Unified treatment of the Coulomb and harmonic oscillator potentials in D dimensions

Quantum mechanical models and practical calculations often rely on some exactly solvable models like the Coulomb and the harmonic oscillator potentials. The D dimensional generalized Coulomb potential contains these potentials as limiting cases, thus it establishes a continuous link between the Coulomb and harmonic oscillator potentials in various dimensions. We present results which are necessary for the utilization of this potential as a model and practical reference problem for quantum mechanical calculations. We define a Hilbert space basis, the generalized Coulomb-Sturmian basis, and calculate the Green’s operator on this basis and also present an SU(1,1) algebra associated with it. We formulate the problem for the one-dimensional case too, and point out that the complications arising due to the singularity of the onedimensional Coulomb problem can be avoided with the use of the generalized Coulomb potential. PACS numbers: 03.65.Fd, 03.65.Ge, 03.65.Nk Typeset using REVTEX