Klein's programme and Quantum Mechanics

Abstract: We review the geometrical formulation of Quantum Mechanics to identify, according to Klein's programme, the corresponding group of transformations. For closed systems, it is the unitary group. For open quantum systems, the semigroup of Kraus maps contains, as a maximal subgroup, the general linear group. The same group emerges as the exponentiation of the $C^{*}$--algebra associated with the quantum system, when thought of as a Lie algebra. Thus, open quantum systems seem to identify the general linear group as associated with quantum mechanics and moreover suggest to extend the Klein programme also to groupoids. The usual unitary group emerges as a maximal compact subgroup of the general linear group.