CONFINED HARMONICALLY INTERACTING SPIN-POLARIZED FERMIONS IN A MAGNETIC FIELD : THERMODYNAMICS

We investigate the combined influence of a magnetic field and a harmonic interparticle interaction on the thermodynamic properties of a finite number of spin-polarized fermions in a confinement potential. This study is an extension using our path integral approach of symmetrized density matrices for identical particles. The thermodynamical properties are calculated for a three-dimensional model of N harmonically interacting spin-polarized fermions in a parabolic potential well in the presence of a magnetic field. The free energy and the internal energy are obtained for a limited number of particles. Deviations from the thermodynamical limit become negligible for about 100 or more particles, but even for a smaller number of fermions present in the well, scaling relations similar to those of the continuum approximation to the density of states are already satisfied.