NON-MARKOVIAN BOLTZMANN-EQUATION

A quantum kinetic equation for strongly interacting particles (general ized binary collision approximation, lander or T-matrix approximation) is derived in the framework of the density operator technique. In con trast to conventional kinetic theory, which is valid on large lime sca les as compared to the collision (correlation) time only, our approach retains the full time dependencies, especially also on short time sca les. This means retardation and memory effects resulting from the dyna mics of binary correlations and initial correlations are included. Fur thermore, the resulting kinetic equation conserves total energy (the s um of kinetic and potential energy). The second aspect of generalizati on is the inclusion of many-body effects, such as self-energy, i.e., r enormalization of single-particle energies and damping. To this end we introduce an improved closure relation to the Bogolyubov-Born-Green-K irkwood-Yvon hierarchy. Furthermore, in order to express the collision integrals in terms of familiar scattering quantities (Moller operator , T-matrix), we generalize the methods of quantum scattering theory by the inclusion of medium effects. To illustrate the effects of memory and damping, the results or numerical simulations are presented. (C) 1 997 Academic Press.