Wave packet experimental detection

[VVS2000]

TL;DR Summary

Are there any experimental setups that verify the wave packet dynamics we work with in quantum mechanics?
It just came up in my QM class while we were discussing and even my teachers could'nt figure it out

I know the wave function "collapses" when a measurement is made but still not satisfied with it

 

[vanhees71]

Rightfully so. The "collapse" is a very questionable concept and not really needed for the physical interpretation of quantum theory. It's obvious that it depends on the specific measurement made on the measured object, which state this object takes after a measurement has been made. E.g., if you detect a photon in the usual way using the photoelectric effect (e.g., using a CCD cam or a photoplate) this photon gets absorbed and is thus gone for good.

It's of course very difficult to measure "wave-packet dynamics". An example is this:

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.72.3783
https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/2978244/478_5187y.pdf

 

[PeterDonis]

I know the wave function "collapses" when a measurement is made

Exactly what "collapse" means depends on which QM intepretation you adopt. Note that discussion of particular interpretations belongs in the interpretations subforum.

In the absence of any particular interpretation, "collapse" is just the mathematical procedure we use to update our model when we know the result of a measurement, and no assertion is made at all about what, if anything, "actually happens".

 

[vanhees71]

The "collapse" is simply the update of the state after the interaction with a "filter". This idealized "von Neumann filter measurements" are very rarely achieved. An example is the Stern-Gerlach experiment for measuring and preparing spin states of an atom (in the original experiment silver atoms). Here the atom is send through an inhomogeneous magnetic field. According to quantum mechanics the atom moves in different discrete directions depending on the value of the spin component in direction of the magnetic field. Then the position (or momentum) of the atom is entangled with this value of the spin component, i.e., you can just block all atoms which are at positions referring to the spin value you don't want, and thus all atoms going through this filter have a determined spin component in direction of the magnetic field, and you describe them by a corresponding wave function which is a eigenstate of this spin component with the eigenvalue you filtered out.

 

[VVS2000]

Exactly what "collapse" means depends on which QM intepretation you adopt. Note that discussion of particular interpretations belongs in the interpretations subforum.

In the absence of any particular interpretation, "collapse" is just the mathematical procedure we use to update our model when we know the result of a measurement, and no assertion is made at all about what, if anything, "actually happens".

yeah I know, that's why I told I was not satisfied with that answer