We are used to describe the detection of light in terms of particles and its propagation from the source to the detection, by waves. For instance, the slowing down of light in a transparent medium is always explained within the electromagnetic wave framework. We propose to approach that phenomenon through a purely corpuscular description. We find expression for the refractive indices which differ slightly from the usual Maxwell wave approach. We thus compare these expressions against experimental refractive indices and we show that both reproduce well the data. We show also how this corpuscular framework gives a very natural interpretation to the self focusing Kerr effect. Finally an experimental expectation of fluctuation of the speed of light is presented.
We are used to describe the detection of light in terms of particles and its propagation from the source to the detection, by waves. For instance, the slowing down of light in a transparent medium is always explained within the electromagnetic wave framework. We propose to approach that phenomenon through a purely corpuscular description. We find expression for the refractive indices which differ slightly from the usual Maxwell wave approach. We thus compare these expressions against experimental refractive indices and we show that both reproduce well the data. We show also how this corpuscular framework gives a very natural interpretation to the self focusing Kerr effect. Finally an experimental expectation of fluctuation of the speed of light is presented.
The long history of the dispute among physicists as to whether matter is composed of particles or waves is reviewed. A turning point came at the dawn of the 20th century in the form of the de Broglie momentum-wavelength and Bohr/Planck energy frequency relations. It was on this basis that Schrödinger developed a quantum mechanical differential equation whose solution came to be known as a wave function. The Born Interpretation of these functions holds that their absolute square constitutes a probability distribution which has been used successfully to make predictions of the properties of the system under discussion. It is pointed out that the phenomenon of light refraction played a key role in the development of both Newton’s corpuscular theory of light and the competing theory of Huygens which looks upon light as consisting exclusively of waves. It is shown that Newton’s failure to predict the decrease in the speed of light as it passes from air into water was not because of his belief in the particle composition of light, but rather because he not did anticipate that the mass of a photon changes upon entering a medium of higher index of refraction n. By assuming that the energy E of light is equal pc/n, where p is the momentum of the photons and c is the speed of light in free space, it is shown that the experimental dependence of the speed the light on its wavelength as it passes through a transparent medium is derived successfully through the use of Hamilton’s Canonical Equations and Newton’s Second Law of Kinetics. It is suggested that the relationship between particles and waves can be understood by noting that the localized properties of matter exhibit themselves in experiments such as the photoelectric effect where attention can be concentrated on the behavior of a single particle. The corresponding wave properties occur when large numbers of particles are observed under exactly similar circumstances, as for example in electron diffraction. ...........
We discuss an event-based corpuscular model of optical phenomena that does not require the knowledge of the solution of a wave equation of the whole system and reproduces the results of Maxwell's theory through a series of cause-and-effect processes, starting with the emission and ending with the detection of a particle. Event-based models of a single-photon detector and of light propagation through an interface of two dielectrics are used as modular building blocks to give a unified, corpuscular description of many optical phenomena. The approach is illustrated by applications to Wheeler's delayed choice, Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm and Hanbury Brown-Twiss experiments.
The contents of the article is mirrored in its title. In science the fact is well-known, that often opposite notions about that or diverse phenomenon result in identical end results, that produces bitter controversies of the opponents. The example can be served by century dispute between the supporters of the wave and corpuscular nature of light, dispute between a system of Ptolemy and Copernicus and many other conflictings in the most miscellaneous areas of science. The wave description of physical phenomena cannot be executed without of elastic medium (ether) in which one there is a wave process and is diffused by means of this elastic medium. Therefore description of wave phenomena in a solid, liquid and gas adequately mirrors the test datas and problems here does not arise. There, where the elastic medium misses, it is necessary to invent miscellaneous ruses to distribute the wave description and to these objects: empty world space (world ether in the miscellaneous fancy forms), internal space of atoms (wave functions of probability), fields (short-range interaction of fields by means of transfer of a disturbance from one point to other), electromagnetic radiation of the Maxwell (simultaneous oscillation magnetic and electrical field in an elastic medium). The wave description of world is fine is designed, since above it many generations of the known scientists worked, but main brake here it is necessary to have in stock an elastic medium. There, where it no or there are doubts in its existence, a field for critics there is opened. In the formal-mathematical description of the world the elastic medium is not necessary any more. Record a wave equation and decide it for the diversified cases. Though in mathematical relation such description of the world perfectly, but the physical sense of mathematical manipulations is lost. Specially it notably in a quantum mechanics. As a consequence, the similar description it is easy to subject a severe critic. To be salvaged from of intrusive critics, it is necessary to invent completely fancy notions about a microcosmos, which one do not have conformity in a macroworld. Thus, the unity of the world is upset, that directly contradicts fundamental laws of universe. The absence of physical sense is the main unremovable brake of the formal-mathematical description of the world. The corpuscular description of the world, basically, is a merit of Newton. Because of small number of the supporters of such description «have defeated» wave notions. The main brake for of corpuscular world was established by Newton, by formulating the law even and rectilinear motion of free bodies. This law has become force majeure for explanation of an interference, polarization and some other properties of light. Attempts to mate the wave description with corpuscular (wave-corpuscle dualism of microparticles [1]) are originally doomed on a fall because of a principled difference between a wave and particle. The ether is not necessary for the corpuscular description of the world in any to the form, therefore photon, for example, billions of years not «being spread» can move in space, that is impossible from the point of view of the wave description of its motion. The main lack of the corpuscular description of the world consists in incompletness of official toolkit for such description. Only new corpuscular quantum physics has entered notion about originating of a gravidynamic field at motion of gravitational charges and bound with this fact by screw motion of free bodies. It has allowed to revise many fundamental rules of classic physics and quantum mechanicses and to realise a capability of the corpuscular description of the world to the full. Unfortunately, it has taken place after in heads of the scientists strongly was fixed paradigm, designed Einstein and fathers of a quantum mechanics. This paradigm had time knock home in heads of millions students and even of the homemakers. In outcome new scientific paradigm on the basis of new physics meets aggressive hostility. It, certainly, temporary phenomenon and the victory new paradigm in science is foregone, as was already repeatedly. It is a pity, that this the temporary interval, usually, exceeds temporary existence of the person in the land of the living, and orthodoxes permanently self-reproduction by conservative science.
In early 1999, a news article in the prestigious journal Nature led off with the announcement, "An experiment with atoms at nanokelvin temperatures has produced the remarkable observation of light pulses traveling at velocities of only 17 m/s." The review continued with the understatement, "Observation of light pulses propagating at a speed no faster than a swiftly moving bicycle...comes as a surprise." These findings (and their review) marked the beginning of the current wave of interest in the field that has come to be called "slow light.â" When we refer to "the speed of light," we typically mean c, the phase velocity of light in a vacuum, or the speed of propagation of the phase fronts of monochromatic light. The phase fronts travel more slowly through a material, propagating at the speed c/n, where n is the index of refraction of the medium. However, this ordinary slowing of the phase velocity is not slow light. "Slow light" and "fast light" refer to changes in the group velocity of light in a medium. A pulse of light can be decomposed mathematically into a group of monochromatic waves at slightly different frequencies, as in Fig. 19.1. In a dispersive material, these monochromatic waves travel at different speeds. When one views the propagation of the pulse as a whole, its apparent velocity depends on the extent of the spread of individual monochromatic-wave velocities. Each monochromatic wave travels at its own phase velocity, while the pulse travels at the group velocity. Of course, the group velocity of a pulse of light is not a new concept. The field of slow and fast light has drawn on theory and developments from the work of Sommerfeld and Brillouin from 1907 to 1914, experiments with early laser amplifiers in 1966, and other work done through the end of the 20th century. (For more of the history behind slow and fast light, see Refs. 8 and 9.)
The physical principle at the beginning of electromagnetic waves is different from that of light. In fact electromagnetic waves are produced by modulation of current intensity of conduction electrons in metals that generates an electromagnetic field in the space. Light instead is made up of energy corpuscles, named photons, that are produced by electron quantum jumps among energy different levels of atom. In this paper a transition frequency from the wave nature of electromagnetism to the corpuscular nature of light is defined. We prove further that diffraction isn't an exclusive property of waves and an original interpretation of diffraction according to the corpuscular theory is furnished utilizing the Fourier integral. A theoretical explanation on propagation of photon is finally given through the new concept of electromagnetic nanofield.