Can a Photon Have a Perfectly Smooth Orbit?

[Leon (AW)]

can a photon have a perfectly smooth orbit?

say for e.g. you have a photon orbiting a point, if its wavelength were to become twice the diameter of its orbit then would the wave not become a replica of the orbit offset by the amplitude?

similarly say the amplitude is the radius of the orbit and the wavelength is the diameter would the wave not travel in a straight line through the centre?

 

[mfb]

Photon orbits require black holes, otherwise their deflection is not strong enough. I don't think those orbits are stable, but I would have to check. If the orbits are unstable, you don't have to worry about interference - the photon will not live long enough anyway. If the orbits are stable, photons might be long-living for specific frequencies only.

offset by the amplitude? [...] similarly say the amplitude is the radius of the orbit

The amplitude of a photon is not a displacement or length in space.

 

[Leon (AW)]

The amplitude of a photon is not a displacement or length in space.

Isn't its displacement in space the principal through which polorization works?

 

[mfb]

No, it is the direction of the electric field. This is NOT a line in space (but some images are misleading, as they plot it like that), the direction is defined at every point in space.

 

[George Jones]

Photon orbits require black holes, otherwise their deflection is not strong enough. I don't think those orbits are stable, but I would have to check. If the orbits are unstable, you don't have to worry about interference - the photon will not live long enough anyway. If the orbits are stable, photons might be long-living for specific frequencies only.
The amplitude of a photon is not a displacement or length in space.

Yup, photon orbits around black holes are unstable.

 

[Claude Bile]

My intuition is that you cannot get stable photonic modes around a singularity due to diffraction of the photonic wavefunction.

Claude.