Related papers: Asking photons where they have been in plain langu…
The quantum description of reality is quite different from the classical one. Understanding this difference at a fundamental level is still an interesting topic. Recently, Dragan and Ekert [New J. Phys. 22 (2020) 033038] postulated that…
We contest the recent claim by C. Eberlein (Physical Review Letters 76 (1996) 3842) that sonoluminescence may be explained in terms of quantum vacuum radiation. Due to fundamental physical limitations on bubble surface velocity, the…
Optical experiments designed to explore quantum complementarity are reanalyzed. It is argued that, for each, a classical explanation is not only possible, but more coherent and less contrived. The final conclusion is that these experiments…
Comment on A.F. Abouraddy, P.R. Stone, A.V. Sergienko, B.E.A. Saleh, and M.C. Teich, ``Entangled-Photon Imaging of a Pure Phase Object,'' Phys. Rev. Lett. 93, 213903 (2004). Unpublished (rejected by Physical Review Letters), but for a…
If a wave function does not describe microscopic reality then what does? Reformulating quantum mechanics in path-integral terms leads to a notion of "precluded event" and thence to the proposal that quantal reality differs from classical…
In classes on cosmology, students are often told that photons stretch as space expands, but just how physical is this picture? Does space really expand? In this article, we explore the notion of the redshift of light with Einstein's general…
Quantum mechanics states that a particle emitted at point (x_1,t_1) and detected at point (x_2,t_2) does not travel along a definite path between the two points. This conclusion arises essentially from the analysis of the two-slit…
Contrary to general belief, the Fraunhofer lines have been found to be plasma redshifted and not gravitationally redshifted, when observed on Earth. Quantum mechanical effects cause the photons' gravitational redshift to be reversed as the…
It is demonstrated that in contrast to the well-known case with a quantum particle moving freely in a real line, the wave packets corresponding to the coherent states for a free quantum particle on a circle do not spread but develop…
We develop a semiclassical theory to describe the photon momenta in left-handed materials (LHMs). A single two-level atom is introduced as an "explorer" to probe the momenta of photons. We demonstrate that the linear momentum of the photons…
A century after its conception, quantum mechanics still hold surprises that contradict many "common sense" notions. The contradiction is especially sharp in case one consider trajectories of truly quantum objects such as single photons.…
A conserved photon current is derived from the commutation relations satisfied by the electromagnetic four-potential and field tensor operators. The density is found to be a sum over positive and negative frequency terms, both of which…
In a recent article [Chin. Phys. Lett. 34, 020301 (2017)], Ben-Israel et al. have claimed that the experiment proposed in [Chin. Phys. Lett. 32, 050303 (2015)] to determine the past of a quantum particle in a nested Mach-Zehnder…
We argue that the claim given in quant-ph/9801014 remains untenable in the revised version. The fallacy in the proof is a misinterpretation of the no-cloning and teleportation theorems, which do not involve time and reference frames.
Recent experiments with identically tuned nested Mach-Zehnder interferometers which attempted to observe the location of particles inside these interferometers are analyzed. In spite of claims to the contrary, it is argued that all…
A quantum mechanics representation based on position ($\vec{r}$), linear momentum($\vec{p}$) and energy($E$) eigenvalues is presented here. A set of equations, explicitly independent on wave function, was derived relating these observables.…
Astronomical observations of the orbital angular momentum of photons, a property of electromagnetic radiation that has come to the fore in recent years, have apparently never been attempted. Here, I show that measurements of this property…
Quantum trajectories describe the stochastic evolution of an open quantum system conditioned on continuous monitoring of its output, such as by an ideal photodetector. In practice an experimenter has access to an output filtered through…
Possible paths of a photon passing through a nested Mach-Zehnder interferometer on its way to a detector are analyzed using the consistent histories formulation of quantum mechanics, and confirmed using a set of weak measurements (but not…
We show both analytically and numerically that photons from a probe pulse are not stored in several recent experiments. Rather, they are absorbed to produce a two-photon excitation. More importantly, when an identical coupling pulse is…