Wave-Particle Duality Paper 19/12/2019

Abstract
The following paper is the collective In this paper, basic concepts concerning the dual
nature of elementary particles is discussed. Extra-
efforts of the following students: curricular information, such as the black body and the
ultraviolet catastrophe, are mentioned here to facilitate
 Ahmed Ewis the presentation of the lesson discussed here, and
 Adham Ibrahim students are encouraged to read about them. This
 Mostafa Fouad paper does not fully explain all points concerning dual
nature in the syllabus, and some points, purposely,
 Youssef Bedair have not been added to the presentation. Fellow
students reading this paper are also advised to read it
in conjunction with revising the textbook, as both are
complementary to each other.

Introduction
Wave-particle duality is one of the fundamental concepts on which the modern theory of quantum mechanics is built
on. Stating that a photon or an electron is a wave and particle at the same time until it (whatever “it” in this context
here means) is observed[1] is unintuitive to say, but we’re talking about quantum mechanics here, where logic is being
illogical. The dual nature of an elementary particle is built on experimental observations, where particles seem to
“choose” whether to be manifested particles or waves that propagate through space-time. Scientists, till this day, have
been unable to fully come up with a model that can accurately describe the behavior of elementary particles under all
circumstances[2]. Physicists such as Einstein, Max Planck and Paul Dirac greatly facilitated answering the puzzling
questions concerning the mentioned model, but the puzzle is yet to be solved, time is of the essence to gift us the
solution.
This paper explains Topic 3D:1 in the syllabus. The objectives of this paper are as follow:
1. Understand how the behavior of electromagnetic radiation can be described in terms of both waves and
photons.
2. Use the equation E=hf for the energy of a photon of electromagnetic radiation.
Each section of the paper covers a key point in the key points listed below.

Key points:
1) Huygens’ principle and its significance
2) Wave nature of light: Young’s Double slit experiment
3) Particle nature of light: Quantization of energy and the photon model equation E=hf
4) Particle nature of electrons demonstrated by Millikan’s oil drop experiment
5) Wave nature of electrons demonstrated by diffraction pattern seen by electrons passing through a crystal lattice

This list breaks up chapter 3D:1 into 5 simple key points, where each key point is discussed separately, and a
conclusion that summarizes the topic is reached at the end of this paper.
Wave-Particle Duality Paper 19/12/2019
Key point 1: Huygens’ principle and its significance
In 1678, Haans Christian Huygens proposed a theory that revolutionized our understanding of light and its
characteristics[3]. The principle wonderfully and elegantly explains basic light phenomena, such as diffraction and
reflection of light waves upon meeting a boundary during the wave’s propagation. It states that: Every point on a
wavefront is itself the source of circular wavelets. The line connecting these circular wavelets forms the wavefront ,
thus allowing to accurately predict the new movement of the wave.
Huygens stated that light is a wave that propagates through space much like ripples in water or sound in air. Hence
light spread out like a wave along with all directions from a source. The line connecting all the crests, or troughs, of a
wave at a given point in time is called a wavefront.
Secondly, every point on the wavefront acts as a secondary source of light that emits more wavefronts. The net effect
is that the effective wavefront generated is tangential to all the secondary wavefronts generated by the secondary
sources as shown in the figure. In this way, a light wave propagates through space by generating secondary sources
and wavefronts. The direction of the traverse is always perpendicular to the wavefronts.
The Huygens’ theory explains the wave theory of light phenomena of diffraction, interference, reflection and
refraction well, considering it was proposed two centuries ago. (The former two phenomena were not even discovered
until the 19th century).
Figure 1 is a demonstration of the Huygens’ principle:

Figure 1. demonstration of the Huygens’ principle

Wave-Particle Duality Paper 19/12/2019
Key point 2: Wave nature of light: Young’s double slit experiment
Young’s double-slit experiment[4] uses two coherent sources of light placed a small distance apart, usually around the
value of the wavelength of light used, in order to achieve the maximum diffraction of the light wave possible.
Young’s double-slit experiment helped in understanding the wave theory of light which is explained with the help of
the following diagram. A screen or photodetector is placed at a large distance ’D’ away from the slits as shown in
figure 2a:

[Figure 2a.] Young’s double slit experiment

As the light waves pass through the slits, they are diffracted and become circular waves. Both waves interfere with
each other; where the path difference between the two waves is n times the wavelength, the waves interfere
constructively, and a bright spot is seen on the screen, whereas the waves interfere destructively where the path
difference is (n+0.5) time the wavelength, and a dim, or dark, spot is seen on the screen where the waves meet, where
n is an integer in both cases. The following figures, 2b and 2c, show how the interference looks like and how it
happens:

[Figure 2b.] How the interference looks like [Figure 2c.] How the interference happens

The original Young’s double-slit experiment used diffracted light from a single source passed into two more slits to be
used as coherent sources. Lasers are commonly used as coherent sources in the modern-day experiments, since the
waves produced by a laser are coherent.
Wave-Particle Duality Paper 19/12/2019

Key point 3: Particle nature of light: Quantization of energy and the photon model equation
E=hf

In 1901, a German physicist, Max Planck, published a paper on the theory of quantization of energy [5],
which was used to explain the black body radiation and intelligently solved the ultraviolet catastrophe. Max
Planck stated that light can be thought of discrete packets of energy travelling from its source of emission.
This is called quantization of energy, where quantization here means that the packets of energy are
exceedingly small. The packets of energy are called “quanta”, and the energy of each individual quanta
directly depends on the frequency of the light when it is thought of as a wave, where the figures are
described by the photon model equation E=hf, where h here is the Planck’s constant (6.63x10-34J.s). The
Planck’s constant is the smallest difference in the energy values of a photon, which means that our universe
has a lower bound for the least amount of energy in a system that involves energy transfer on the quantum
scale, such as the quantum field fluctuations.
This finding was phenomenal and completely revolutionized physics at the time, despite Max Planck not
fully comprehending how big of a deal his work was. It was not until 1921 when Einstein published the
paper that awarded him the prestigious Nobel prize in Physics [6]; The photoelectric effect, when he used this
idea of quantization of light energy to explain the observations of his experiment[7].
Not only did Max Planck’s theory of quantization of energy solve the ultraviolet catastrophe, but it also
allowed physicists to answer one of the most puzzling questions at the time; why objects emit light. When
the electrons of an atom lose energy, the energy they lose is manifested into a particle of light, a photon,
which led to the conclusion that there are discrete energy levels, in a given atom, where the electrons exist
based on their energy. This allowed physicists to explain the line spectrum produced by the excitation of
gas’s atoms, and ultimately find out what the core of the sun is made of[8].
The scope of how successful and beautiful Planck’s theory of energy quantization is way beyond the
syllabus, and we will not dig further into it, as we encourage students to read about the theory.
Wave-Particle Duality Paper 19/12/2019
Key point 4: Particle nature of electrons demonstrated by Millikan’s oil drop experiment
In 1897, J.J. Thomson showed that the existence of ions implies that electrons are particles [9]. This is because a fixed
charged mass must be liberated from an atom in order to form an ion. However, although this was a good evidence
on the particle nature of electrons, Robert Millikan worked on Thomson’s theory and tried to find the charge of the
mass that leaves the atom, i.e.: the electron charge [10].

In brief, the experiment involved spraying oil drops in a vacuum where electric potential difference is applied over a
fixed distance. By using X-rays to ionize the oil drops and a microscope to observe the small oil drops, some oil drops
have been found to be hung between the charged plates that produce the potential difference. Millikan concluded
that the electric force applied on a hung oil drop is equal to the force of gravity pulling it down. This balance of
forces allowed a charged oil drop to remain in mechanical equilibrium. The steps that conclude how the charge is
calculated are not explained here, as they are not included in the syllabus.

Key point 5: Wave nature of electrons demonstrated by diffraction pattern seen by electrons
passing through a crystal lattice

Despite the theoretical evidence, published by Thomson, and the experimental evidence, published by Millikan, on
the particle nature of electrons, bizarreness arose when another experiment showed that electrons can behave as
waves[11]. This was concluded when diffraction was seen when a beam of electrons produced a diffraction pattern in
the from of rings on a graphite screen, when the beam is shone onto a solid crystal lattice, as shown in figure 5:

[Figure 3.] diffraction pattern of an electron beam

Conclusion
After covering the 5 main key points in the paper, and successfully satisfying the objectives of the lesson, the reader
should develop basic understanding of the wave-particle duality of elementary particles. Physicists have good
theoretical descriptions of the wave and particle natures for electrons and electromagnetic radiation. However,
there is no single, perfect theory that explains both correctly for either electrons or EM radiation [12].
Wave-Particle Duality Paper
References
[1] P.A.M. Dirac (1947). The Principles of Quantum
Mechanics (2nd ed.). Clarendon Press. p. 12.
[2] Physics for Scientists and Engineers With Modern
Physics Fourth Edition. Giancoli p. 997.
[3] "Huygens' Principle". MathPages.
[4] “While there is no doubt that Young's demonstration of
optical interference, using sunlight, pinholes and cards,
played a vital part in the acceptance of the wave theory of
light, there is some question as to whether he ever actually
performed a double-slit interference experiment.”
 Robinson, Andrew (2006). The Last Man Who Knew
Everything. New York, NY: Pi Press. pp. 123–
124. ISBN 978-0-13-134304-7.
[5] M. Planck, Verhandl. Dtsch. phys. Ges.,2,237 “On the
Theory of the Energy Distribution Law of the Normal
Spectrum” p. 3.
19/12/2019
[Figure 1.]
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Huygens-
Principle-of-a-propagating-wave-
front_fig2_278022914
[Figure 2a.] https://byjus.com/jee/youngs-double-slit-
experiment/
[Figure 2b.] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-
slit_experiment#/media/File:Double-slit.svg
[Figure 2c.]
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Double-slit-
experiment-illustrating-the-wave-behavior-of-
light_fig16_263928386
[Figure 3.] https://www.quora.com/What-is-observed-
when-moving-electrons-are-allowed-to-fall-on-a-thin-
graphite-film-and-the-emergent-beam-falls-on-a-
fluorescent-screen

[6] “The Nobel Prize in Physics 1921”. NobelPrize.org.

[7]  Einstein, Albert (1905). "Über einen die Erzeugung und
Verwandlung des Lichtes betreffenden heuristischen
Gesichtspunkt" [On a Heuristic Point of View about the
Creation and Conversion of Light] (PDF). Annalen der
Physik (in German). 17 (6): 132–
148. Bibcode:1905AnP...322..132E. doi:10.1002/andp.1905
3220607.
English translations:

 Einstein, Albert. "On a Heuristic Point of

View about the Creation and Conversion of
Light" (PDF). Translated by Dirk ter Haar.
 Einstein, Albert. "On a Heuristic Point of
View about the Creation and Conversion of
Light". Translated by Wikisource.

[8] Bohr, N. (1922). "Nobel Lecture: The Structure of the

Atom". The Nobel Foundation. 

[9] Arabatzis, T. (2006). Representing Electrons: A

Biographical Approach to Theoretical Entities. University of
Chicago Press. pp. 70–74, 96. ISBN 978-0-226-02421-9.

[10] Millikan, R.A. (1911). "The Isolation of an Ion, a

Precision Measurement of its Charge, and the Correction of
Stokes' Law" (PDF). Physical Review. 32 (2): 349–
397. Bibcode:1911PhRvI..32..349M. doi:10.1103/PhysRev
SeriesI.32.349.

[11] Falkenburg, B. (2007). Particle Metaphysics: A Critical

Account of Subatomic Reality. Springer.
p. 85. Bibcode:2007pmca.book.....F. ISBN 978-3-540-
33731-7.

[12] Physics Student book 1. Miles Hudson. p. 134.

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