Extremely High Energy Photons?

[phantom887]

I was wondering whether it was possible for an extremely high energy photon to exist, or if there's a limit to the energy in just one photon. And I'm talking REALLY high energy here. Like twice the energy of, say, the gamma rays released in a supernova. If this is possible, what is that photon? Is it just a high energy gamma ray, or could it be something else?

 

[JeffKoch]

To my knowledge there isn't a limit, though one could speculate about Planck-length wavelength limits that might arise from quantum gravity, assuming there is such a theory and that someone eventually figures it out. Such a photon would have an energy of ~ 10GJ, which is equivilent to tons of TNT. There is no experimental evidence that such photons actually exist, and creating them would be, ah, a bit of a challenge.

 

[phantom887]

Yes, yes I DO believe that would be an annoying little obstacle to overcome, wouldn't it? Haha thanks for the answer.

 

[Neandethal00]

I was wondering whether it was possible for an extremely high energy photon to exist, or if there's a limit to the energy in just one photon. And I'm talking REALLY high energy here. Like twice the energy of, say, the gamma rays released in a supernova. If this is possible, what is that photon? Is it just a high energy gamma ray, or could it be something else?

I once calculated, to obtain all the enegry (mass to energy) in the universe, we need one
single photon of frequency ~10⁹⁹ Hz.

 

[Borek]

No limits to the photon energy that I have heard about, but you may google for related Greisen–Zatsepin–Kuzmin limit.