• Accepted Paper

Generalized coulomb problem for a spin-1/2 fermion

V. B. Mendrot, A. S. de Castro, and P. Alberto

Phys. Rev. A - Accepted 16 October, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/74yt-ymt5

Abstract

We study the Dirac equation in 3+1 dimensions with a general combination of scalar, vector and tensor interactions with arbitrary strengths, all of them described by central Coulomb-like potentials acting on a particular plane of motion. For the tensor coupling a constant term is also included, since this gives rise to an effective binding potential, which is necessary for the formation of bound states in a pure tensor coupling configuration. The exact bound-state solutions for this generalized Coulomb problem are computed by exploiting the freedom in choosing the coefficients of the for the radial functions, which leads to wave functions in terms of generalized Laguerre polynomials. From the quantization condition, the exact energy spectrum is also determined and its dependence on the parameters of the potentials is discussed. We show that similar features of the equations for the problem in the plane and the spherically symmetric problem allow a simple and direct mapping between them, thereby allowing the radial solutions and spectrum of the corresponding spherically symmetric problem to be obtained through that mapping. Our results are validated by showing that the solutions correctly encompass several previous solutions available in the literature for particular cases of this problem, for which we further develop the analysis of the parameters. We also derive two new particular cases not yet reported in the literature: the case of breaking of spin and pseudospin symmetries by the addition of a Coulomb-like plus constant tensor potential and the problem of scalar plus tensor Coulomb-like potentials plus a constant tensor potential.

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