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rodsika
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Buckyball Double Slit Experiment
I've been reading old archives here and even the FAQ and still not definite about the answer. It is said that a buckyball composed of 60 carbon atoms can still form interference pattern at the screen. It is not the complexity of the object but the fact that it is in superposition of states that makes it possible to interfere with itself. This means we must not imagine the 60 atoms as solid object in the double slit experiment because they are prepared in such a way that they are in superposition.
So a quantum particle is something that can do superposition. Does it mean that something that can do superposition lose any classical meaning of a particle. That is. If you can make the buckyball in superposition, then the atoms literally smear itself and lost any properties of atoms and become just waves?
Many physicists said to just consider them as quantum objects.. which is not exactly a particle or wave. But in the buckyball.. at some point, it has to travel in between the emitter and detector. So as quantum object, we mustn't imagine it as being a buckyball particle but as a quantum buckyball? But we know a buckyball is solid... as someone said "It consists of complex structure of 60 carbon atoms that in turn have complex structure of 6 electrons and ~12 nucleons that again in turn consist of 3 quarks. So it has 4 levels of structure (quarks-nucleons-nucleus-electron shells-molecule) consisting of different elementary particles with different charges and mass". So how can you imagine the buckyball as something that is not a buckyball. At what stage does it exhibits wave like property in between emitter and detector that makes it possible to interfere with itself??
Also it is said that the superposition is about superposition of eigenpositions and not superposition of positions. So we shouldn't think of it in terms of the buckyball duplicating themselves in all possible positions. But just superposition of virtual positions. But what does it mean the buckyball is in superposition? How can that be?
What exactly happens during superposition? Does the buckyball lose any sembrance of any classicality and the 4 levels of structure of quarks-nucleons-nucleus-electron shells-molecule dissolves into ghost-like state that is why it can still interfere with itself at the slit?