10 questions linked to/from Fundamental Limits for Photon Detection
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If a photon truly goes through both slits (at the same time), then why can't we detect it at both slits (at the same time)?

I am not asking about whether the photon goes through both slits, or why. I am not asking whether the photon is delocalized as it travels in space, or why. I have read this question: Do we really ...
5k views

What's the physical meaning of the statement that “photons don't have positions”?

It's been mentioned elsewhere on this site that one cannot define a position operator for the one-photon sector of the quantized electromagnetic field, if one requires the position operator have ...
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EM wave function & photon wavefunction

According to this review Photon wave function. Iwo Bialynicki-Birula. Progress in Optics 36 V (1996), pp. 245-294. arXiv:quant-ph/0508202, a classical EM plane wavefunction is a wavefunction (in ...
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Effect of wavelength on photon detection

When some photon detector detects a photon, is it an instantaneous process (because a photon can be thought of as a point particle), or does the detection require a finite amount of time depending on ...
464 views

If turning a perfectly monochromatic laser on for a finite time gives a frequency spread, where did the other frequency photons come from?

I changed again the mind experiment to avoid any explanation involving doppler effect or nonlinear interaction I expressed the same problem under a different angle but it will probably make the ...
563 views

Why doesn't there exist a wave function for a photon whereas it exists for an electron?

A photon is an excitation or a particle created in the electromagnetic field whereas an electron is an excitation or a particle created in the "electron" field, according to second-quantization. ...
419 views

photon wave function, double slit, single photon source

There's an old argument by Newton and Wigner, that the photon as a massless particle can't have a position operator and therefore no position space wave function. How does this tie in with the double ...
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Why do objects above absolute zero start emitting electromagnetic radiation in infrared light first rather than radio or microwave?

I have a very rudimentary understanding of electromagnetic radiation and how it corresponds to temperature. It is my understanding that any object above absolute zero first starts emitting radiation ...