This work was first published in 1947 in German under the title "Re chenmethoden der Quantentheorie". It was meant to serve a double purpose: to help both, the student when first confronted with quantum mechanics and
the experimental scientist, who has never before used it as a tool, to learn how to apply the general theory to practical problems of atomic physics. Since that early date, many excellent books have been written introducing
into the general framework of the theory and thus indispensable to a deeper understanding. It seems, however, that the more practical side has been somewhat neglected, except, of course, for the flood of special monographs
going into broad detail on rather restricted topics. In other words, an all-round introduction to the practical use of quantum mechanics seems, so far, not to exist and may still be helpful. It was in the hope of filling this
gap that the author has fallen in with the publishers' wish to bring the earlier German editions up to date and to make the work more useful to the worldwide community of science students and scientists by writing the new
edition in English. From the beginning there could be no doubt that the work had to be much enlarged. New approximation methods and other developments, especially in the field of scattering, had to be added. It seemed
necessary to include relativistic quantum mechanics and to offer, at least, a glimpse of radiation theory as an example of wave field quantization.
Industry Reviews
From the reviews: "Anyone who has taught a course of quantum mechanics knows the difficulty of providing practical examples which are within the mathematical competence of the students and can be completed in a reasonable time. In this book will be found 219 problems, together with their solutions, which will greatly extend the repertoire. (...) The first volume deals exclusively with one-body problems without spin. (...) In the second volume the problems cover a wider range and include illustrations of the introduction of spin, the interactions between two and three particles, quantum statistics and the Dirac relativistic equation with shorter sections on non-stationary problems and radiation theory. (...)" Nature, Sept. 10, 1971. "The student who can master these problems will have a good grasp of the practical applications of quantum theory and, therefore, of the basic concepts as well. I recommend the book unreservedly." The Australian Physicist, May 1972.