Delayed-Choice Experiments and the Concept of Time in Quantum Mechanics

Jhonny Castrillón, Enrique J. Galvez, Boris A. Rodríguez +1 more

Abstract Laboratory experiments that illustrate the fundamentals of quantum physics are powerful teaching instruments because they re-enact thought experiments, allowing students to think deeper about the quantum-mechanical principles involved. Interference, wave–particle duality and entanglement are among the most important predictions of quantum mechanics. They are abstract and counter-intuitive. More recent concepts that help illustrate these subtleties include quantum erasure and delayed choice. In this article we present an experiment for the undergraduate laboratory that involves all of these issues or concepts. The experiment entails only minor modifications to a well-known setup for doing single-photon interference. In this article we present the experiment, its results and a theoretical description.

Warner A. Miller, JOHN ARCHIBALD WHEELER

George Jaroszkiewicz

Delayed choice and quantum eraser experiments have attracted much interest recently, both theoretically and experimentally. In particular, they have prompted suggestions that quantum mechanics involves acausal effects. Using a recently developed approach which takes apparatus into account, we present a detailed analysis of various double-slit experiments to show that this is never the case. Instead, quantum experiments can be described in terms of a novel concept of time called stages. These can cut across the conventional linear time parameter as experienced in the laboratory and appear to violate causality.

Qi Guo, Liu‐Yong Cheng, Hong‐Fu Wang +1 more

Pavel Vyacheslavovich Kurakin

Previously we presented general formulation of hidden time concept as a basis for building a dynamical picture underlying quantum mechanics. Here, we present detailed explanation of how hidden time works for basic quantum optical experiments, to make hidden time concept visually concievable and open for criticism.