Journal ArticleDOI
Origin of quantum-mechanical complementarity probed by a ‘which-way’ experiment in an atom interferometer
Reads0
Chats0
TLDR
In this article, the authors reported a which-way experiment in an atom interferometer in which the back action of path detection on the atom's momentum is too small to explain the disappearance of the interference pattern.Abstract:
The principle of complementarity refers to the ability of quantum-mechanical entities to behave as particles or waves under different experimental conditions. For example, in the famous double-slit experiment, a single electron can apparently pass through both apertures simultaneously, forming an interference pattern. But if a ‘which-way’ detector is employed to determine the particle's path, the interference pattern is destroyed. This is usually explained in terms of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, in which the acquisition of spatial information increases the uncertainty in the particle's momentum, thus destroying the interference. Here we report a which-way experiment in an atom interferometer in which the ‘back action’ of path detection on the atom's momentum is too small to explain the disappearance of the interference pattern. We attribute it instead to correlations between the which-way detector and the atomic motion, rather than to the uncertainty principle.read more
Citations
More filters
Book
Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning
TL;DR: Barad, a theoretical physicist and feminist theorist, elaborates her theory of agential realism as mentioned in this paper, which is at once a new epistemology, ontology, and ethics.
Book
Genetic Programming: An Introduction
TL;DR: The authors discuss GP software tools, including Discipulus, the GP software developed by the authors, and Appendix D mentions events most closely related to the field of genetic programming.
Journal ArticleDOI
Optics and interferometry with atoms and molecules
TL;DR: The development of wave optics for light brought many new insights into our understanding of physics, driven by fundamental experiments like the ones by Young, Fizeau, Michelson-Morley and others as mentioned in this paper.
Journal ArticleDOI
Fidelity approach to quantum phase transitions
TL;DR: In this article, the authors review the quantum fidelity approach to quantum phase transitions in a pedagogical manner, and relate all established but scattered results on the leading term of the fidelity into a systematic theoretical framework, which might provide an alternative paradigm for understanding quantum critical phenomena.
Journal Article
Getting real: technoscientific practices and the materialization of reality
TL;DR: Agential Realism as mentioned in this paper is an epistemological and ontological framework that extends Bohr's insights and takes as its central concerns the nature of materiality, the relationship between the material and the discursive, nature of nature and of culture, and relationship between them.
References
More filters
Book
Albert Einstein: philosopher-scientist
TL;DR: In this paper, the author describes the failure of classical mechanics and the rise of the electromagnetic field, the theory of relativity, and of the quanta, and the book is faced, page-by-page, with a translation by the noted Professor of Philosophy Paul Arthur Schilpp.
Journal ArticleDOI
Quantum optical tests of complementarity
TL;DR: In this paper, a new detector for atom interferometers, constructed with the aid of modern quantum optics, provides a way around the obstacle of position-momentum uncertainty relation and allows the investigation of other mechanisms that enforce complementarity.
Journal ArticleDOI
Verification of coherent spinor rotation of fermions
TL;DR: In this article, the perfect crystal neutron interferometer was used to test the spinor rotation of spin- 1 2 -systems and showed interference oscillations consistent with the predicted 4π-value.