# Tag Info

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Accepted

### Is there any way to check superposition in a source of photons?

To your first question: Can we distinguish the states $| 5_H 5_V \rangle$ and $| 5_L 5_R \rangle$? Yes, by measuring in the $\{H, V \}$-basis. For the $| 5_H 5_V \rangle$ state it's clear that in this ...
• 2,839

### Can electromagnetic waves be polarized without any being absorbed or blocked? (I.e., no energy is lost?)

It is possible to polarise EM radiation without using a polarising filter. If you periodically accelerate electrons all in the same direction, you will get polarised radiation, which, however, is ...
• 9,283

### Can electromagnetic waves be polarized without any being absorbed or blocked? (I.e., no energy is lost?)

In practice we cannot, filters and reflection polarizers either absorb some part of beam energy or split the unpolarized beam into two or more polarized beams. The latter case can be lossless as a ...
• 32.5k
1 vote

### Can electromagnetic waves be polarized without any being absorbed or blocked? (I.e., no energy is lost?)

Yes, polarizers (that turn unpolarized light into polarized light) are always blocking for the "unwanted" polarization. So they are lossy. That is they block one orientation of circular ...
• 2,085