Hello, thank you ahead of time to anyone who reads and comments. I love these boards, but I have never posted before.

I read this on wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment
“Returning again to electrons, when electrons are fired one at a time through a double-slit apparatus they do not cluster around two single points directly on lines between the emitter and the two slits, but instead one by one they fill in the same old interference pattern with which we have now become quite familiar.”

The electrons fired in this experiment travel at the speed of light correct?

Isn’t it correct that anything traveling the speed of light does not experience time?

We experience time, so the electrons appear to us to be firing one at a time.

What if electrons fired one at a “time” do not experience time; therefore they behave as if fired all at once?

Please, be gentle

Welcome to the BAUT forum.


No, the electrons do not move at the speed of light.

However, the single-particle interference in a double-slit experiment has been observed with photons, which do move at the speed of light.

Such experiments have been performed on all sorts of particles, from electrons and photons up to molecules.


This is all based on your assumption that the particles move at the speed of light.
But since these experiments work as expected with particles that move at lower speeds, your idea does not work for them.

As a matter of experimental fact, whether the particles move at the speed of light or not, does not affect the outcome of the experiment, because the single-particle interference is the consequence of the quantum nature of the particles.

But, wouldn't your question be more appropriate to the Q&A forum...?

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papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

I see where you're going with this, but as papageno points out, electrons do not move at the speed of light. They have mass, so cannot.Wouldn't that be a consequence of their wave nature? It appears that the OP intended to draw an ATM conclusion.

Not entirely.
The interesting feature of the experiment is that the quantum particles interact with the screen with particle-like properties (little dots appear one at a time), and only after a while the interference pattern becomes apparent.
If you had just a wave going through the system, then the interference pattern would be observed from the beginning.

This experiment shows very nicely the quantum nature of the particles, because you get both the particle-like and the wave-like behavior.





[Would I be right in thinking that this is my kilopi post...?]

__________________
papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

I agree that it's a function of their wave nature. Electrons have a very strong kinship with photons. After all, it's the excited electron which emits a photon when it moves from it's excited orbital to it's base orbital. It's only natural that they might share some properties.

I wasn't aware, however, that electons exhibited the same properties with the dual-slit experiment as did photons (color me ignorant). Can anyone verify that this is indeed the case?

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I am Mugs, of the Alien clan of Usa, Nordamerica, a Terran, of Sol.

Perception isn't reality. It's merely an abstraction thereof, and quite often not a very good one at that.

I am human. Fully human.

O I agree that that is definitely the most interesting part of the experiment!

I was just commenting on "the single-particle interference is the consequence of the quantum nature of the particles"
Next post! The first instance of kilopi on BABB/BAUT, in a post of ToSeek.

It has nothing to do with the fact that electrons and photons interact. It has to do with the fact that both photons and electrons are quantum particles, and as such their state is mathematically a wave-function.


You have never seen the cheesy 70s educational movie: single electron interference ?

These experiments have been done with a lot of different type of particles, up to atoms and molecules, and in different media (such as semiconductors).



Ah, I see what you mean.




[So... this must be my kilopi post, right?]

__________________
papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

Fireworks!