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International Conference on Large Scale Applications and Radiation Hardness of Semiconductor Detectors (RD)

Single Electron Interference and Diffraction Experiments with a High Energy Physics Detector

G. L. Alberghi, Roberto Donà, Alessandro Gabrielli, Filippo Maria Giorgi, M. Villa, Gioṙgio Matteucci, Nicola Semprini-Cesari, Antonio Zoccoli, Stefano Frabboni, Gian Carlo Gazzadi

Published Mar 25, 2015• 1 citation
Publisher

Abstract

The Young-Feynman two-slit experiment for single electrons was carried out by inserting two nanometric slits and a fast recording system, capable of detecting the electron arrival-time, in a conventional transmission electron microscope. The sensor, designed for experiments at future high energy colliders, is based on a custom 4096 Monolithic Active Pixels CMOS chip, is equipped with a fast readout chain and can manage up to 10^6 frames per second, allowing the collection of high statistic samples of single electron events within a time interval compatible with the stability of the experimental setup and the coherence conditions of the illumination. For the first time in a single electron two-slit experiment, the time distribution of electron arrivals was obtained.

DOI
10.22323/1.189.0026

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The Young-Feynman two-slit experiment for single electrons was carried out by inserting two nanometric slits and a fast recording system, capable of detecting the electron arrival-time, in a conventional transmission electron microscope. The sensor, designed for experiments at future high energy colliders, is based on a custom 4096 Monolithic Active Pixels CMOS chip, is equipped with a fast readout chain and can manage up to 10^6 frames per second, allowing the collection of high statistic samples of single electron events within a time interval compatible with the stability of the experimental setup and the coherence conditions of the illumination. For the first time in a single electron two-slit experiment, the time distribution of electron arrivals was obtained.
The Young-Feynman two-slit experiment for single electrons has been carried out by inserting in a conventional transmission electron microscope two nanometric slits and a fast recording system able to measure the electron arrival-time. The detector, designed for experiments in future colliders, is based on a custom CMOS chip of 4096 monolithic active pixels equipped with a fast readout chain able to manage up to 10 6 frames per second. In this way, high statistic samples of single electron events can be collected within a time interval short enough to guarantee the stability of the system and coherence conditions of the illumination. For the first time in a single electron two-slit experiment, the time distribution of electron arrivals has been measured.
A conventional transmission electron microscope is used as a versatile optical bench in a setup where a pixel recording system, sensitive to single electrons, replaces the final viewing screen. Our detector is based on a custom CMOS chip of 4096 monolithic active pixels designed for applications in vertex detectors of future collider experiments. The chip is equipped with a fast read-out chain able to manage up to 106frames per second. This capability permitted to collect high statistics samples of single electron events within a time interval where the stable operations and the coherence conditions of the microscope were guaranteed. The microscope was configured with an accelerating potential of 60 kV, hence leading to 60 keV electrons. The large fraction of empty events made possible to obtain measurements of the time distribution of electron arrivals and this is what really characterizes this work. In fact, for the first time, conventional interference patterns have been split into single-electron frames according to the time of arrival. In particular, the 4096-pixel sensor has been used to collect diffraction patterns of a single wire, a carbon grating and eventually to reproduce the Young-Feynman two-slit experiment with single electrons instead of light. The experiment has been carried out by inserting two nanometric slits-two 100 × 1500 nm slits, 500 nm spaced apart-in the microscope that provided the electron beam source and the electro-optical lenses for projecting and focusing the pattern on the sensor. The fast readout of the sensor allowed us to record single-electron frames, spaced by several empty frames, and this is an improvement over past single-electron interference works. In this way the time distribution of the single electron arrivals has been measured with a timing resolution of 160 μs. This research might also open new detector investigation and development and characterization of pixel sensors.
A conventional transmission electron microscope, equipped with a fast recording system able to measure the electron arrival time and the position of single electrons, is used to show the build-up of interference patterns. Two experiments are presented. The first is the electron version of the Grimaldi and Young experiments performed with light, where single electrons strike on an opaque thin wire. Interference fringes are observed in the geometrical shadow of the wire and diffraction effects are clearly displayed at the wire edges. The second, original experiment reports the build-up of two-slit interference patterns with single electrons.
The key features of quantum mechanics are vividly illustrated by the Young-Feynman two-slit thought experiment, whose second part discusses the recording of an electron distribution with one of the two slits partially or totally closed by an aperture. Here, we realize the original Feynman proposal in a modern electron microscope equipped with a high brightness gun and two biprisms, with one of the biprisms used as a mask. By exciting the microscope lenses to conjugate the biprism plane with the slit plane, observations are carried out in the Fraunhofer plane with nearly ideal control of the covering of one of the slits. A second, new experiment is also presented, in which interference phenomena due to partial overlap of the slits are observed in the image plane. This condition is obtained by inserting the second biprism between the two slits and the first biprism and by biasing it in order to overlap their images.
The two-slit interference experiment is usually adopted to discuss the superposition principle applied to radiation and to show the peculiar wave behaviour of material particles. Diffraction and interference of electrons have been demonstrated using, as interferometry devices, a hole, a slit, double hole, two-slits, an electrostatic biprism etc. A number of books, short movies and lectures on the web try to popularize the mysterious behaviour of electrons on the basis of Feynman thought experiment which consists of a Young two-hole interferometer equipped with a detector to reveal single electrons. A short review is reported regarding, i) the pioneering attempts carried out to demonstrate that interference patterns could be obtained with single electrons through an interferometer and, ii) recent experiments, which can be considered as the realization of the thought electron interference experiments adopted by Einstein-Bohr and subsequently by Feynman to discuss key features of quantum physics.