- #1
JDługosz
- 346
- 0
Consider, to give a concrete example, an Airy Ring pattern appearing on a phosphor screen when electrons are sent through a single hole.
Send one electron through.
If it passed through the hole while maintaining a straight path that it must have followed from the emitter (another small hole, perhaps) to the screen, then all is well.
If the electron landed elsewhere in the pattern—that is, it diffracted—then the momentum vector of the electron is different, as the straight line from its final position to the hole points in a different direction than the line from the hole back to the source.
How is momentum conserved?
―John
Send one electron through.
If it passed through the hole while maintaining a straight path that it must have followed from the emitter (another small hole, perhaps) to the screen, then all is well.
If the electron landed elsewhere in the pattern—that is, it diffracted—then the momentum vector of the electron is different, as the straight line from its final position to the hole points in a different direction than the line from the hole back to the source.
How is momentum conserved?
―John