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Single Photon Experiment on the Proof of Pilot Wave Existence

Vladimir A. Skrebnev

Published Dec 1, 2019• 0 citations
OpenAlex

Abstract

The experiment measured the absorption of single photons by absorbers with various absorption coefficients, in one of the beams, after the photons interacted with the beam splitter. The measurements showed that the absorption corresponds to single photon traveling in either one or another beam. The results of our measurements and of singlephoton interference experiments, combined together, demonstrate the existence of the pilot wave. The need to perform further experiments is emphasized.

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The experiment measured the absorption of single photons by absorbers with various absorption coefficients, in one of the beams, after the photons interacted with the beam splitter. The measurements showed that the absorption corresponds to single photon traveling in either one or another beam. The results of our measurements and of singlephoton interference experiments, combined together, demonstrate the existence of the pilot wave. The need to perform further experiments is emphasized.
The appearance of a particle in a certain point in space, the full waves and the empty waves are considered as a consequence of subquantum processes. The experiment is described that measured the absorption of single photons by absorbers with various absorption coefficients, in one of the beams, after the photons interacted with the beam splitter. The measurements showed that the absorption corresponds to single photon traveling in either one or another beam. The results of our measurements and of single photon interference experiments, combined together, demonstrate the existence of the empty waves, that is, the excitations in the subquantum world, which do not contain a photon. We show that seemingly justified criticism of our interpretation of the experiment is not valid. New experiments are proposed to study single-photon interference involving an empty wave.
The appearance of a particle in a certain point in space, the full waves and the empty waves are considered as a consequence of subquantum processes. The experiment is described that measured the absorption of single photons by absorbers with various absorption coefficients, in one of the beams, after the photons interacted with the beam splitter. The measurements showed that the absorption corresponds to single photon traveling in either one or another beam. The results of our measurements and of single photon interference experiments, combined together, demonstrate the existence of the empty waves, that is, the excitations in the subquantum world, which do not contain a photon. We show that seemingly justified criticism of our interpretation of the experiment is not valid. New experiments are proposed to study single-photon interference involving an empty wave.
The production of maxima and minima by the superposition of two or more light signals provides fundamental support for the wave nature of light. This result is based on the study of wave interference phenomena which remains the only approach to explain the production of those maxima and minima. In a system that is prepared to work with only one photon at a time, any detector can signal only one or zero. In 1986, a rigorously controlled experiment was designed by Grangier, G. Roger, and A. Aspect, [Europhys Lett. 1(4), p. 173, 1986] that guaranteed a single-photon beam. The explanation of the experimental results implied the interference of the wave function of a single-photon with itself. Thus, the explanation of interference that is accepted for an ensemble of photons was assumed to be valid for a single photon. In this study, we prepare a Mach-Zehnder interferometer using the same type of beam splitters used by Grangier et al. to test the assumption mentioned above. Our results allow us to explain the results of Grangier et al. because of the interaction between light and the beam splitters. Our results also verify that their wave interpretation of the results is not valid. Here, we present the essential findings of the extensive experimental evidence that supports our ideas.
According to the de Broglie pilot wave theory, a pilot wave which is empty of photons is still capable of physical effects like induced coherence. We have carried out an experiment to test this prediction. The experiment involves interference of photons produced by down-conversion in two nonlinear crystals and depends on the mutual coherence induced between the two signal beams by an idler. When the photon is removed from the idler by a beam splitter, it is found that the resulting ``empty pilot wave'' no longer induces coherence. This violates at least the Selleri-Croca version of the de Broglie pilot wave theory makes the physical reality of the corresponding pilot wave doubtful.
It has been suggested that a single photon can interfere with itself even if the difference between the two paths in the interferometer is larger than the ``length'' of the photon [Kessel' and Moiseev, JETP Lett. 58, 81 (1993)]. The interference is regained by detecting the photons using a photon-echo process, where the absorbing atoms will, effectively, act as narrow-band filters. Such an experiment has several unique features. For example, single photons are used to carry out what is generally regarded as a multiphoton process; the absorption of a single photon can be regarded as separated into two different moments in time; the fact that the single-photon interference is regained using atoms acting as narrow-band filters as the detector means that the control of the detection process is quite different from cases where electronic (or possibly photographic) detection is used to register the interference etc. In general, interference and absorption are combined and intertwined in the experiment, which is discussed in this paper, in a way that has not been done before. In the present paper the possibility to carry out such an experiment in practice is investigated in some detail. The signal strength is explicitly calculated and the results are compared with our experimental data for the case of many interfering photons. We imply that this result can readily be extrapolated to the single-photon situation. We analyze the material parameters that are important for carrying out the experiment and give specific examples of some suitable materials.