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Ontophobe
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Do photons obey the conservation law of angular momentum?
Photons are circularly polarized ('helicity') to conserve angular momentum (Δl = ±1)Ontophobe said:Do photons obey the conservation law of angular momentum?
A photon is a fundamental particle of light that carries energy and behaves both as a particle and a wave. It has no mass and travels at the speed of light.
Angular momentum is a physical quantity that represents the rotational motion of an object. In the case of photons, their angular momentum is related to their polarization, or the direction of their electric and magnetic fields.
Orbital angular momentum of photons refers to the rotation of the photon's trajectory around an axis, while spin angular momentum refers to the intrinsic spin of the photon itself.
No, photons can only have positive or zero angular momentum. This is because they have a spin of 1, which is always a positive value.
Angular momentum is always conserved in any interaction, including those involving photons. This means that the total amount of angular momentum before and after the interaction remains the same. In the case of photons, their angular momentum can be transferred to the matter they interact with, or vice versa.