Wave mechanics and the tunnel effect

Guenter Nimtz, Paul Bruney

Tunnelling and barrier interaction times of neutrons were previously measured. Here we show that the neutron interaction time with barriers corresponds to the universal tunnelling time of wave mechanics which was formerly observed with elastic, electromagnetic and electron waves. The universal tunnelling time seems to hold for neutrons also. Such an adequate general wave mechanical behaviour was conjectured by Brillouin. Remarkably, wave mechanical effects, and even virtual particles, hold from the microcosm to the macrocosm.

Linda Wessels

Guenter Nimtz, Paul Bruney

Abstract Tunnelling and barrier interaction times of neutrons were previously measured. Here we show that the neutron interaction time with barriers corresponds to the universal tunnelling time of wave mechanics which was formerly observed with elastic, electromagnetic and electron waves. The universal tunnelling time seems to hold for neutrons also. Such an adequate general wave mechanical behaviour was conjectured by Brillouin. Remarkably, wave mechanical effects, and even virtual particles, hold from the microcosm to the macrocosm.

Paul Gombás, D. Kisdi

N. F. Mott, Ian Naismith Sneddon

N. A. Torkhov

A physical model proposed in this paper resolves existing contradictions between wave and corpuscle properties of quantum particles (electrons) in tunneling effect. By means of AFM methods the work shows that the existence of the second electron on the other side of potential barrier is necessary to realize a tunneling effect in a probe-surface system. At this, only quantum mechanical state of the electron — not its corpuscular properties — described by the wave function tunnels (penetrates) through the potential barrier. The presence of the second electron on the other side of the potential barrier is necessary to establish concatenation with the first, so to say, ‘tunneling’ one. At lack of the second electron on the other side of the potential barrier, only tunneling quantum mechanical state of the first electron is possible — without transferring its corpuscular properties.