Non-Hermitian Hamiltonian and Lamb shift in circular dielectric microcavity

We study the normal modes and quasi-normal modes (QHMs) in circular dielectric microcavities through non-Hermitian Hamiltonian, which come from the modifications due to system-environment coupling. Differences between the two types of modes are studied in detail, including the existence of resonances tails. Numerical calculations of the eigenvalues reveal the Lamb shift in the microcavity due to its interaction with the environment. We also investigate relations between the Lamb shift and quantized angular momentum of the whispering gallery mode as well as the refractive index of the microcavity. For the latter, we make use of the similarity between the Helmholtz equation and the Schrodinger equation, in which the refractive index can be treated as a control parameter of effective potential. Our result can be generalized to other open quantum systems with a potential term. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.