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Wave Particle-Duality with a Single Photon: the Delayed Choice Gedanken Experiment - at Last a Real Experiment

Prof. Alain Aspect

Institut d'Optique, Palaiseau, France

Monday, 16 November 2007, 11.00am, EN101, Ground Floor, Engineering Building, Hawthorn.

Wave-particle duality is at the root of the quantum revolution initiated at the beginning of the 20th century, and most textbooks on quantum physic s start with a description of an "experiment" to demonstrate it. In contrast to common belief, this textbook experiment was only realized in 1985, after the development of the first source of single photons. The most fascinating scheme of that Gedanken Experiment - the "delayed-choice" experiment proposed by J.A. Wheeler- has been recently implemented. We will present that experiment, which stresses one big "quantum mystery" in the words of Feynman.

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