2006/11/30 by M. L. Martínez Ricci, M. L. Martinez Ricci, J. Mazzaferri +3 · 1 voice
Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Experimental and Theoretical Physics Studies #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect #Quantum Information and Cryptography #physics.optics
paper · pdf · doi:10.1119/1.2742400
published as Am. J. Phys. 75(8), pp. 707-712, 2007 · 13 pages, 9 Figures, 1 Table, Original File Type: MS-Word, Submitted File type: pdf - Last Version: Whole paper improvement, references added
openalex publication_date 2007/07/13 · arxiv created 2007/10/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We present a photon counting experiment designed for an undergraduate physics laboratory. The statistics of the number of photons of a pseudo-thermal light source is studied in two limiting cases: much longer and much shorter than the coherence time, giving Poisson and Bose-Einstein distributions, respectively. The experiment can be done in a reasonable time using a digital oscilloscope without the need of counting boards. The use of the oscilloscope has the advantage of allowing the storage of the data for further processing. The stochastic nature of the detection phenomena adds additional value because students are forced to do data processing and analysis.