Corpuscular model of two-beam interference and double-slit experiments with single photons

TL;DR

This paper presents a corpuscular simulation model that reproduces wave-like interference patterns in single-photon experiments through information exchange mechanisms, without relying on wave equations or non-local interactions.

Contribution

The authors develop an event-based corpuscular model that accurately reproduces interference patterns in single-photon experiments without wave equations or non-locality.

Findings

Simulation reproduces interference patterns with individual particles.

Interference arises from information exchange with detectors.

Model matches experimental results without wave-based assumptions.

Abstract

We introduce an event-based corpuscular simulation model that reproduces the wave mechanical results of single-photon double slit and two-beam interference experiments and (of a one-to-one copy of an experimental realization) of a single-photon interference experiment with a Fresnel biprism. The simulation comprises models that capture the essential features of the apparatuses used in the experiment, including the single-photon detectors recording individual detector clicks. We demonstrate that incorporating in the detector model, simple and minimalistic processes mimicking the memory and threshold behavior of single-photon detectors is sufficient to produce multipath interference patterns. These multipath interference patterns are built up by individual particles taking one single path to the detector where they arrive one-by-one. The particles in our model are not corpuscular in the standard, classical physics sense in that they are information carriers that exchange information with the apparatuses of the experimental set-up. The interference pattern is the final, collective outcome of the information exchanges of many particles with these apparatuses. The interference patterns are produced without making reference to the solution of a wave equation and without introducing signalling or non-local interactions between the particles or between different detection points on the detector screen.