Quantum Phenomena
All observable phenomena are inherently quantum events, but due to the coarseness of our senses and measuring instruments, only in some circumstances are quantum effects manifest. These are known as quantum phenomena.
This sequence of photographs shows that photography is a quantum process. In the fist photographs, the number of photons is very small, and they arrive on the film with a probability proportional to the brightness of the image at that point. The number of photons ranges from about 3 000 in the first exposure to about 30 000 000 in the final exposure [CREDIT: Prof. Thomas D. Rossing, Vision: Human and electronic]
Notes
In lessons we shall discuss any questions and go through examples mainly. For each lesson, you must either
- hand in a reading memo on paper at the beginning of the lesson, or
- complete an online reading memo via the MIT interface by 9.30 p.m. the evening before the lesson.
- Photoelectric effect | reading memo | with your annotations
- VIDEO: Photoelectric effect demonstration
- PhET simulation - An applet which simulates the photoelectric effect
- Ionization and excitation | reading memo | with your annotations
- Energy levels and line spectra | reading memo | with your annotations
- Fluorescence | reading memo | with your annotations
- Wave–particle duality | reading memo | with your annotations
Homework questions
Other interesting stuff
- Low-energy electron diffraction (LEED) poster
- The quantum exchange - resources for learning more about the quantum world
