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A laser pointer at 2B FPS [video]

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615 points thunderbong | 3 comments | 19 Oct 25 06:42 UTC | HN request time: 0.506s | source
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estimator7292 ◴[21 Oct 25 01:15 UTC] No.45651413[source]▶
Tl:dw for how this works:

He scans one line at a time with a mirror into a photomultiplier tube which can detect single photon events. This is captured continually at 2MSample/s (2 billion times per second: 2B FPS) with an oscilloscope and a clever hack.

The laser is actually pulsing at 30KHz, and the oscilloscope capture is synchronized to the laser pulse.

So we consider each 30KHz pulse a single event in a single pixel (even though the mirror is rotating continuously). So he runs the experiment 30,000 times per second, each one recording a single pixel at 2B FPS for a few microseconds. Each pixel-sized video is then tiled into a cohesive image

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1. hi41 ◴[21 Oct 25 13:32 UTC] No.45655578[source]▶
Can we not find why the strange behavior of a double split experiment occurs using this setup?
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2. SAI_Peregrinus ◴[21 Oct 25 13:40 UTC] No.45655684[source]▶
No, all the light seen as in "beams" is scattered off fog. That scattering is a measurement from the perspective of QM.
3. estimator7292 ◴[21 Oct 25 19:29 UTC] No.45660511[source]▶
We already know why and the double slit experiment has been by thousands if not millions of students and researchers.

But as sibling said, this is still a measurement and will collapse the quantum system. You can't use this to peek under the hood and look at the quantum mechanics.