Hydrodynamic analysis of the Schrödinger-Langevin equation for wave packet dynamics

Frictional effects on the wave packet dynamics of quantum systems are investigated in the framework of the Schrödinger-Langevin equation. The Schrödinger-Langevin equation is directly solved using the split-operator method. Frictional effects impede the propagation and suppress the spreading of the wave packet. Computational results are presented for an Eckart barrier scattering problem, the decay of a metastable state, and the long-time behavior of a decaying quantum system. Significant features of dissipative Bohmian trajectory dynamics are analyzed for these quantum processes.