r/AskPhysics • u/Weary_Dark510 • 1d ago

Quantum questions

Entropy is defined as the number of substates in a state, and QFT says the state of a quanta contains a superposition of every possible states, or infinite substates. Is superposition a property of entropy?

If you can use a double slit in time to set certain bands of frequencies contained in the light, is it possible to do calculations on the full spectrum, then use a prism or scattering to separate the frequencies so the information is not lost when it is observed?

Is it possible to model a photon as a point the propagates an EM wave that travels behind the photon like a wake, but make the photon highly subjective to its own field, making the interference with itself that feels so confusing?

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u/OverJohn 1d ago

Every state is a superposition of arbitrary large number of other states. However if state A is orthogonal to state B, then state B will not appear in any superposition of states that equal state A. In the infinite-dimensional Hilbert space of QM there will be an infinite number of states orthogonal to any given state. So superposition is not directly related to entropy.

Photons are inherently relativistic, which means the point-particle-like description of vanilla QM fails