Collision of Photons to get different photon as result

[Tinamuline]

Collision of Photons

I would like to know the answer of the following question: -

Can two photons of different energies collide together to form a new photon with the energy equals to the sum of individual photon i.e. E(new) = E(photon 1) + E(photon 2) ?
I would appreciate it if someone could help me answer the question.

 

[subharpe]

Re: Collision of Photons

I think this is not possible. Because different energy means different frequencies. Sum of energies means some of frequencies. If two waves of different frequencies collide or overlap, the resultant wave does not possess the frequency which is the some of the two, rather the overlap of the wave functions will lead to complicated nature othe resultant wave function.

 

[Tinamuline]

Re: Collision of Photons

I do agree with you. However, what I want to make here is that if red light mixes with green light, yellow light will be produced. What does it imply? From my point of view, it implies that photon of red light (E1 = hf1) mixes with photon of green light (E2 = hf2) to produce photon of yellow light (E3 = hf3) through a special wave function/equation. In the other words, photon adds up another photon will end up with a new photon.
If I am wrong, please correct me and seek your comment. Thank you.

 

[House_Cat]

Re: Collision of Photons

Your example of red light mixing with green to produce yellow is faulty. The perceived color of two lights together is a human vision issue, not a physics issue. Color televisions, for example, use the three light primary colors to give a wide range of colors to the images on the screen. That does not mean that the light characteristics of the beams from the TV were altered in any way - it's just that your eye combines the individual colors on the retina to give the appearance of a single color.

Experiments have been done ( https://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/getdoc/slac-pub-2597.pdf ) , and are ongoing ( **broken link removed** ), regarding the collision of photons in high energy colliders. There are quantum interactions, but as yet there have been no solid conclusions.

 

[sat]

Collision of Photons

Can someone define collision here? That will help.
Is there any role of mass and momentum in collision? make me remember photon's mass [not the rest-mass] and the momentum - well remember C is constant so if there was mass and you get some momentum absolutely deterministically - Heisenberg's uncertainty will make position of collision completely non-deterministic, where will they collide? In other words, will they ever collide in space?

Mixer - get sum and diff terms - nonlinearity is required [ be it in space-time or what do you say ]

 

[amredries]

Re: Collision of Photons

I think that the photon is not a particle like electron or proton but something that scientist imagine to explain the light behaviour as particle

 

[zorro]

Re: Collision of Photons

I think this is not possible. Because different energy means different frequencies.....

This is not right. Photons do change wavelenght in the Compton effect, when a photon interacts with an electron.

Regards

Z

 

[sreevyas]

Re: Collision of Photons

compto effect is applies when a particle has a rest mass ie electron has a rest mass, if photon interacts with electron the momentum of photon will change(momentum is vector ) so the direction, ie a phonon will release or absorbs,
but incase of photon-photon interaction no rest mass, so it wont interact and release new particle