Explorations

Future Paths of Phenomenology

1st OPHEN Summer Meeting

Repository | Series | Book | Chapter

177742

Observation of the nondispersivity of scalar Aharonov-Bohm phase shifts by neutron interferometry

Anton Zeilinger

pp. 263-265

Abstract

In their 1959 seminal paper Aharonov and Bohm showed, as Ehrenberg and Si-day earlier [1], that in quantum mechanics potentials have a significance that goes beyond that of a mere convenient mathematical tool, as is the case in classical mechanics. This essentially arises from the fact that in quantum mechanics the potentials themselves enter the Schrödinger equation, while in classical mechanics they affect the motion of particles only through their derivatives. To illustrate their conclusions Aharonov and Bohm (AB) proposed two effects in electron interference experiments: the electric or scalar AB effect, resulting from a non-zero electrostatic potential, and the magnetic or vector AB effect, resulting from a non-zero magnetic vector potential.

Publication details

Published in:

Greenberger Daniel, Zeilinger Anton (1999) Epistemological and experimental perspectives on quantum physics. Dordrecht, Springer.

Pages: 263-265

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-1454-9_27

Full citation:

Zeilinger Anton (1999) „Observation of the nondispersivity of scalar Aharonov-Bohm phase shifts by neutron interferometry“, In: D. Greenberger & A. Zeilinger (eds.), Epistemological and experimental perspectives on quantum physics, Dordrecht, Springer, 263–265.