Time of arrival through a quantum barrier

Abstract

We introduce a formalism for the calculation of the time of arrival t at a detector of particles traveling through interacting environments. We develop a general formulation that employs quantum canonical transformations from the free to the interacting cases to compute t. We interpret our results in terms of a Positive Operator Valued Measure. We then compute the probability distribution in times of arrival at a detector of those particles that, after their initial preparation, have undergone quantum tunneling or reflection due to the presence of potential barriers. We obtain the expected retardation or advancement for transmitted wave packets, and non-foreseen double bump structures for some cases of reflection.

23 pages with 3 figures