LYCOS RETRIEVER
Pauli Exclusion Principle: Quantum
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There is hardly another principle in physics with wider scope of applicability and more far-reaching consequences than Pauli's exclusion principle. This book explores the principle's origin in the atomic spectroscopy of the early 1920s, its subsequent embedding into quantum mechanics, and later experimental validation with the development of quantum chromodynamics. Reconstruction of the crucial historic episode provides an excellent foil to reconsider Kuhn's view on incommensurability. The variety of themes skillfully interwoven will appeal to philosophers, historians, scientists and anyone interested in philosophy.
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The Pauli exclusion principle can be derived starting from the assumption that a system of particles occupy antisymmetric quantum states. According to the spin-statistics theorem, particles with integer spin occupy symmetric quantum states, and particles with half-integer spin occupy antisymmetric states; furthermore, only integer or half-integer values of spin are allowed by the principles of quantum mechanics.
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The requirement of antisymmetric wave functions for fermions leads to a fundamental result, known as the exclusion principle, first proposed in 1925 by the Austrian physicist Wolfgang Pauli. The exclusion principle states that two fermions in the same system cannot be in the same quantum state. If they were, interchanging the two sets of coordinates would not change the wave function at all,...
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Following his development of the exclusion principle, Pauli helped give credence to the matrix theory of quantum mechanics formulated by Werner Heisenberg in 1926. He did so by using matrix theory to derive the spectrum of hydrogen, which can be observed via experiment. Also in 1926, Pauli penned another important scientific treatise, a chapter on quantum theory for the Handbook of Physics. The following year he extended his work with matrix theory to spin, leading to his development of what are now termed the Pauli matrices.
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The Pauli exclusion principle follows mathematically from the definition of the angular momentum operator (rotation operator) in quantum mechanics. The exchange of particles in the system of two identical particles (which is mathematically equivalent to the rotation of each particle by 180 degrees) results either in the change of the sign of wave function of the system (when the particles have half-integer spin) or not (when the particles have integer spin). Thus, no two identical particles of half integer spin can be at the same quantum place - because the wave function of such system must be equal to its opposite - and the only wave function which satisfies this condition is the zero wave function.
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