ABSTRACT
After deriving the quantum mechanical model polaron Hamiltonian, Frohlich, Pelzar and Zineau presented a perturbative solution to the problem. This chapter examines the perturbation theory from Frohlich et al. and presents other important weak and intermediate coupling polaron theories. It discusses several polaronic properties like average number of virtual phonons in the polaron cloud, electron life-time, lattice polarization potential using the first-order perturbative wave function and obtained the polaron energy and the polaron mass using the second-order Rayleigh-Schrodinger perturbation theory (RSPT). The second-order RSPT is known to have a limited range of validity. In the one-phonon Tamm-Dancoff approximation, the exact ground state energy appears in the denominator instead of the unperturbed energy that appears in RSPT. The chapter also discusses the work of Lee and Pines who have used the Tomonaga's approximation made in the formulation of the meson-theoretic problem to the case of polaron.
