Resonant transfer of excitation between two molecules using Maxwell fields.

The matrix element for the resonant transfer of excitation between two molecules possessing electric and magnetic multipole moments of arbitrary order is calculated using quantum electrodynamical response theory. A prerequisite of the method is the functional form for the lth order linear electric and magnetic multipole dependent electric displacement and magnetic field operators in the neighborhood of a molecule, whose derivation is also given. The initially unexcited species is viewed as a test body accepting energy resonantly via coupling to the Maxwell fields of the excited multipole source molecule. The generalized electric-electric multipole contribution to the matrix element is shown to agree with an earlier calculation using time-dependent perturbation theory. As an application involving both electric and magnetic terms, the rate of excitation transfer between two chiral molecules is computed and found to depend on the handedness of each species. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics.