Tunneling of polymer particles

Abstract

In this paper we study the tunneling using a background independent (polymer) quantization scheme. We show that at low energies, for the tunneling through a single potential barrier, the polymer transmission coefficient and the polymer tunneling time converge to its quantum-mechanical counterparts in a clear fashion. As the energy approaches the maximum these polymer quantities abruptly decrease to zero. We use the transfer matrix method to study the tunneling through a series of identical potential barriers. We obtain that the transmission coefficients (polymer and quantum-mechanical) behave qualitatively in a similar manner, as expected. Finally we show that the polymer tunneling time exhibits anomalous peaks compared with the standard result. Numerical results are also presented.