Quantum Mechanics

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In the late nineteenth and early twenty century, the assumptions and laws of classical physics where challenged by experiments with light and atoms. Einstein's interpretation of the photoelectric effect, collisions between atoms and photons, and the spectrum of hydrogen pointed to the need for a new theory of mechanics on the microscopic scale. The new theory, called quantum mechanics, was developed by many physicists and chemists who worked intensely in the early twentieth century. This equation, invented by Erwin Schrodinger, expresses the new understanding of how particles like electrons move around atoms. It is used extensively by physics researchers and physics students all over the world.

Far from a finished story, the sometimes bizarre predictions of quantum physics are still being explored. This picture shows the results of a computer simulation of a Bose-Einstein Condensate in which gases, cooled to remarkably low temperatures using lasers, form an unusual quantum mechanical state in which a single probability density function Ψ describes the entire collection of atoms. Bose-Einstein condensates do a lot of surprising things including slowing light to the speed of a car! Predicted by Bose and Einstein in 1924, the first Bose-Einstein condensates were produced in 1995.

How do I get started?

Physics students at Victoria first encounter Schrodinger's Equation in PHYS 114, which they often take in their first semester at the University. Later they will study Schrodinger's equation, its applications, and its implications in PHYS 214 and PHYS 307.