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Phys. Rev. A 66, 052104 (2002) [8 pages]

Measurement-based approach to quantum arrival times

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J. A. Damborenea1,2, I. L. Egusquiza1, G. C. Hegerfeldt3, and J. G. Muga2
1Fisika Teorikoaren Saila, Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea, 644 Posta Kutxa, 48080 Bilbao, Spain
2Departamento de Química-Física, Universidad del País Vasco, Apartado Postal 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain
3Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Göttingen, Bunsenstrasse 9, P-37073 Göttingen, Germany

Received 18 June 2002; published 15 November 2002

For a quantum-mechanically spread-out particle we investigate a method for determining its arrival time at a specific location. The procedure is based on the emission of a first photon from a two-level system moving into a laser-illuminated region. The resulting temporal distribution is explicitly calculated for the one-dimensional case and compared with axiomatically proposed expressions. As a main result we show that by means of a deconvolution one obtains the well-known quantum-mechanical probability flux of the particle at the location as a limiting distribution.

© 2002 The American Physical Society

URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.66.052104
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevA.66.052104
PACS:
03.65.Xp, 42.50.-p
 
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