Wave-Particle Duality in Quantum Mechanics

Wave-particle duality refers to the behavior of quantum entities exhibiting both particle and wave properties, challenging classical concepts like particles or waves. It expresses the inability of classical concepts to fully describe the behavior of quantum objects.

In the late 17th century, Isaac Newton advocated that light was composed of particles, while Christiaan Huygens opposed this view with a wave approach. Thomas Young's interference experiments in 1801 and François Arago's detection of the Poisson spot in 1819 validated Huygen's wave models, challenging Newton's particle theory.

Planck's law for black-body radiation, proposed in 1901, challenged the wave model of light. It heuristically derived a formula for the observed spectrum by assuming that a hypothetical electrically charged oscillator in a cavity containing black-body radiation could only change its energy in a minimal increment, E, that was proportional to the frequency of its associated electromagnetic wave.

<p>Max Planck's work on black-body radiation and his proposal of the minimal energy increment had implications for the behavior of electrons. It indicated that electrons, initially thought to act as particles, also exhibited wavelike aspects, contributing to the concept of duality.</p> Signup and view all the answers

<p>In 1905, Einstein's interpretation of the photoelectric effect, which involved discrete energies for photons, provided further evidence of particle behavior, aligning with the concept of wave-particle duality.</p> Signup and view all the answers