Related papers: Identical Particles in Quantum Mechanics
According to classical physics particles are basic building blocks of the world. Classical particles are distinguishable objects, individuated by physical characteristics. By contrast, in quantum mechanics the standard view is that…
It is shown that quantum systems of identical particles can be treated as if they were different when they are in well differentiated states. This simplifying assumption allows the consideration of quantum systems isolated from the rest of…
Identical classical particles are distinguishable. This distinguishability affects the number of ways W a macrostate can be realized on the micro-level, and from the relation S = k ln W leads to a non-extensive expression for the entropy.…
A remarkable feature of quantum theory is that particles with identical intrinsic properties must be treated as indistinguishable if the theory is to give valid predictions. In the quantum formalism, indistinguishability is expressed via…
Elementary particles in quantum mechanics (QM) are indistinguishable when sharing the same intrinsic properties and the same quantum state. So, we can consider quantum particles as non-individuals, although non-individuality is usually…
The mathematical rules used to handle systems of identical quantum particles bring into question whether the elementary constituents of matter, such as electrons, have the fundamental characteristics of persistence and reidentifiability…
The symmetrization postulates of quantum mechanics (symmetry for bosons, antisymmetry for fermions) are usually taken to entail that \emph{quantum particles} of the same kind (e.g., electrons) are all in exactly the same state and therefore…
We consider the possibility that all particles in the world are fundamentally identical, i.e., belong to the same species. Different masses, charges, spins, flavors, or colors then merely correspond to different quantum states of the same…
We consider entanglement in a system of fixed number of identical particles. Since any operation should be symmetrized over all the identical particles and there is the precondition that the spatial wave functions overlap, the meaning of…
Indistinguishability of particles is normally considered to be an inherently quantum property which cannot be possessed by a classical theory. However, Saunders has argued that this is incorrect, and that classically indistinguishable…
The suggestion that particles of the same kind may be indistinguishable in a fundamental sense, even so that challenges to traditional notions of individuality and identity may arise, has first come up in the context of classical…
In this article, we discuss the identity and indistinguishability of quantum systems and the consequent need to introduce an extra postulate in Quantum Mechanics to correctly describe situations involving indistinguishable particles. This…
Two particles are identical if all their intrinsic properties, such as spin and charge, are the same, meaning that no quantum experiment can distinguish them. In addition to the well known principles of quantum mechanics, understanding…
Distinguishability plays a major role in quantum and statistical physics. When particles are identical their wave function must be either symmetric or antisymmetric under permutations and the number of microscopic states, which determines…
We introduce detector-level entanglement, a unified entanglement concept for identical particles that takes into account the possible deletion of many-particle which-way information through the detection process. The concept implies a…
Quantum particles and classical particles are described in a common setting of classical statistical physics. The property of a particle being "classical" or "quantum" ceases to be a basic conceptual difference. The dynamics differs,…
All particles of the same type are indistinguishable, according to a fundamental quantum principle. This entails a description of many-particle states using symmetrised or anti-symmetrised wave functions, which turn out to be formally…
Theoretical developments related to the gravitational interaction have questioned the notion of particle in quantum field theory (QFT). For instance, uniquely-defined particle states do not exist in general, in QFT on a curved spacetime.…
Quantum coherence plays a fundamental and operational role in different areas of physics. A resource theory has been developed to characterize the coherence of distinguishable particles systems. Here we show that indistinguishability of…
The Gibbs paradox has frequently been interpreted as a sign that particles of the same kind are fundamentally indistinguishable; and that quantum mechanics, with its identical fermions and bosons, is indispensable for making sense of this.…