Stephen M. Barnett

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Stephen Mark Barnett , known as Steve, is a British theoretical physicist who specializes in quantum information theory and quantum optics . He is a professor at the University of Glasgow .

Life

Barnett received his PhD in physics from Imperial College London in 1985.

He is known for investigating the orbital angular momentum (OAM) of light in quantum optics. The research field has application to a potentially much higher information transmission with light in glass fibers. He and his colleagues demonstrated the transmission of information with OAM and its security against eavesdropping in 2004. In 2002, he and others proposed a method to measure the orbital angular momentum of a single photon (which would enable 2 bits to be transported with one photon). He also succeeded in introducing a quantum mechanical phase operator with David Pegg in the late 1980s.

In 2010 he answered the question of whether the momentum of a photon increases or decreases when it penetrates a denser medium. Hermann Minkowski had argued for an increase in 1908, Max Abraham for a decrease in 1909. The classic consideration of reducing the speed of light by a factor of 1 / n in a denser medium with refractive index n (later supported by considerations based on the equivalence of mass and energy and Newton's first law of motion ) speaks for the decrease , for the increase in considerations from quantum mechanics that the wavelength decreases and thus the momentum increases as the inverse of the wavelength (see De Broglie wavelength ). Experiments pointed in both directions. According to Barnett, both apply, depending on how the photon is viewed as a wave or a particle - Abraham's argument corresponds to the kinetic momentum of a particle and Minkowski corresponds to the momentum of the canonical commutation relations. This makes no difference in a vacuum, but it does for light in a medium.

honors and awards

In 2007 Barnett received the Wolfson Research Merits Award and the James Scott Prize from the Royal Society of Edinburgh. In 2013 he received the Dirac Medal (IOP) . Barnett is a Fellow of the Royal Society .

Fonts

  • Quantum Information , Oxford University Press 2003
  • Editor with L. Allen, Miles Padgett Orbital angular momentum , Bristol, IOP Pub. 2003 (reprint volume of essays)
  • with Paul M. Radmore Methods in theoretical quantum optics , Oxford University Press 1997
  • with John A. Vaccaro Quantum phase operator: a review , Taylor and Francis 2007
  • with GL Oppo (editor) Quantum dynamics of simple systems (The Forty-Fourth Scottish Universities Summer School in Physics, Stirling, August 1994), Taylor and Francis 1997
  • Editor with others: Quantum Communication, Measurement and Computing: The Seventh International Conference on Quantum Communication, Measurement and Computing , Glasgow, 25. – 29. July 2004, American Institute of Physics 2004

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Imperial College, Prize Winner 2013
  2. ↑ Graham Gibson, Johannes Courtial, Miles J. Padgett, Mikhail Vasnetsov, Valeriy Pas'ko, Stephen M. Barnett, Sonja Franke-Arnold Free-space information transfer using light beams carrying orbital angular momentum , Optics Express 12, 2004, 5448- 5456
  3. ↑ Jonathan Leach, Miles J. Padgett, Stephen M. Barnett, Sonja Franke-Arnold, Johannes Courtial Measuring the orbital angular momentum of a single photon , Phys. Rev. Lett., Vol. 88, 2002, 257901
  4. ↑ Barnett, David Pegg Unitary phase operator in quantum mechanics , European Physics Letters, Volume 6, 1988, 483
  5. ↑ Barnett, Pegg Phase properties of the quantized single mode electromagnetic field , Phys. Rev. A, Vol. 39, 1989, p. 1665
  6. ↑ Barnett, David T. Pegg On the Hermitian optical phase operator , Journal of Modern Optics, Volume 36, 1989, pp. 7-19, doi : 10.1080 / 09500348914550021
  7. ^ Barnett The solution of the Abraham-Minkowski Dilemma , Phys. Rev. Lett., Volume 104, 2010, 070401, abstract
  8. ^ Cartlidge Both answers correct in century-old optics dilemma , Physics World 2010
  9. ↑ Wolfgang Ketterle (2005) supported an increase, Weilong She (2008) a decrease
  10. ↑ Laudatory speech
personal data
SURNAME Barnett, Stephen M.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Barnett, Stephen Mark (full name); Barnett, Steve
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British physicist
DATE OF BIRTH 20th century