Facts about Quantum Mechanics
- 09
Spin angular momentum of electrons can only take discrete values of plus or minus half a unit of Planck's reduced constant, never intermediate values.
- 08
Entangled particles separated by vast distances exhibit correlated properties instantaneously, a phenomenon Einstein called spooky action at a distance in 1935.
- 07
The double slit experiment demonstrates that unobserved particles pass through both slits simultaneously, but measuring which slit collapses this superposition into a single path.
- 06
Quantum tunneling allows particles to penetrate energy barriers they classically cannot surmount, enabling nuclear fusion in stars and making semiconductor transistors function.
- 05
Photons cannot be split into smaller particles of light, a principle Max Planck discovered in 1900 when explaining blackbody radiation through energy quanta.
- 04
Bell's theorem, proven in 1964, demonstrated that no local hidden variable theory can reproduce all predictions of quantum mechanics, fundamentally challenging classical physics.
- 03
Schrödinger's cat thought experiment from 1935 demonstrates quantum superposition by proposing a cat simultaneously alive and dead until observed, challenging classical intuition about reality.
- 02
Electrons exhibit wave-particle duality, demonstrating interference patterns identical to water waves when unobserved, yet behaving as particles when measured by detectors.
- 01
In 1927, Werner Heisenberg formulated his uncertainty principle, proving position and momentum cannot both be precisely measured simultaneously in quantum mechanics.