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Dylan H. Mahler,1,2* Lee Rozema,1,2 Kent Fisher,3 Lydia Vermeyden,3 Kevin J. Resch,3
Howard M. Wiseman,4* Aephraim Steinberg1,2
Weak measurement allows one to empirically determine a set of average trajectories for an ensemble of quantum
particles. However, when two particles are entangled, the trajectories of the first particle can depend nonlocally on
the position of the second particle. Moreover, the theory describing these trajectories, called Bohmian mechanics,
predicts trajectories that were at first deemed “surreal” when the second particle is used to probe the position of
the first particle. We entangle two photons and determine a set of Bohmian trajectories for one of them using weak
measurements and postselection. We show that the trajectories seem surreal only if one ignores their manifest
nonlocality.
(18). Here, we present an experimental validation of this resolution, in slit particle 1 had gone (even though, in orthodox quantum mechanics, the
which the nonlocality of Bohmian mechanics comes to the fore. particle has no trajectory and hence did not “go through” either slit).
In some situations, Bohmian mechanics accords with that intui-
tion. If the WWM is read out as described above, at time tr > 0, then
THEORY for times t < tr, fH(x2; t) and fV (x2; t) are identical, whereas for
The de Broglie–Bohm dynamics can be formulated in a number of dif- times t > tr , fH (x2; t) and fV (x2; t) have disjoint support. If, at the time
ferent ways (1, 3–6, 9). Here, we present the formulation that is simplest tr, particle 1 is still in the near field of the double-slit apparatus, as in
and most appropriate to our method of empirical determination via Fig. 1A, then the measurement outcome (the position of particle 2) is
weak values (4, 9). Being a complete interpretation of quantum mechan- perfectly correlated with the origin (upper slit or lower slit) of each
ics, Bohmian mechanics applies to arbitrarily many particles and allows Bohmian trajectory. The velocity formula (Eq. 1) for particle 1 and
for internal degrees of freedom (such as spin). Here, we are concerned t > tr, as it traverses
the
apparatus toward the far field, gives
with a two-particle entangled state |Y〉. Denoting the positions (in one −iℏyu′ðx1 ; tÞ −iℏy′ðx
l 1 ; tÞ
Re or Re , respectively, as expected from
dimension for simplicity) of the two particles by x1 and x2, the Bohmian myu ðx1 ; tÞ myl ðx1 ; tÞ
velocity of particle 1 is (4, 9) ˇ single-particle Bohmian mechanics.
〈Yjv 1 jx1 〉jx2 〉 〈x2 j〈x1 jY〉 ESSW, however, consider a situation where the readout via the po-
v1 ðx1 ; x2 Þ ¼ Re ð1Þ sition of particle 2 does not take place until after particle 1 has traversed
〈Yjx1 〉jx2 〉 〈x2 j〈x1 jY〉
ˇ ˇ the double-slit apparatus into the far field. In this case, while particle
where v1 ¼ ðp1 =m1 Þ is the velocity operator for particle 1. 1 traverses the apparatus, fH (x2; t) = fV (x2; t) and the velocity formula
cross the x1 = 0 line. Thus, Bohmian mechanics in this situation predicts single photon propagating close to the z direction has an exact math-
that, when particle 1 is detected in the far field, if x1 > 0, then it must ematical correspondence with the quantum theory of a nonrelativistic
have come from the upper slit, and if x1 < 0, then it must have come particle of mass m = ℏw/c2 propagating in one dimension with posi-
from the lower slit. Moreover, one can show that, in the far field, the tion x and momentum p = ℏkx.
position of particle 1 is almost completely uncorrelated with the spin of As described previously, the mapping out of a set of possible Bohmian
particle 2. Thus, upon detection of particle 1 anywhere in the far field, a trajectories for a particle requires a measurement of momentum followed
measurement of particle 2 can yield either |H〉 or |V〉. A conceptualiza- by a measurement of position, repeated many times (that is, using an
tion of this is displayed in Fig. 1B in which the WWM readout actually ensemble of identically prepared systems) to obtain averages, and re-
occurs in the midfield for clarity. The trajectories corresponding to the peated at many instants in time to connect the trajectory segments. It
measurement outcomes are “surreal” in the sense that the orthodox is the measurement of both position and momentum that makes map-
quantum intuition is that particle 2 should reliably carry the WWM ping out the set of trajectories challenging: Quantum mechanics tells us
information about which slit particle 1 “actually” went through, and that any measurement of momentum will necessarily disturb the posi-
yet we find that the trajectories predicted by Bohmian mechanics often tion of the particle being measured. To circumvent this, we measure the
fail to agree with the outcome of the WWM as read out via particle 2. momentum in such a way that a single shot yields virtually no infor-
The resolution [presented by Hiley et al. (18)] of the apparent par- mation and causes virtually no disturbance, so that the subsequent
adox is in the nonlocality of Bohmian mechanics. In Bohmian me- strong measurement of position reveals [in the Bohmian interpretation
chanics, the spin of particle 2 is described by a Bloch vector s2 that (4)] the Bohmian position of the particle at the point where its mo-
RESULTS
In Fig. 3, we demonstrate the nonlocality present in Bohmian mechan-
ics by showing that the trajectory of photon 1 is affected by the remote
Fig. 2. Experimental setup for measuring Bohmian trajectories: The choice of how to measure photon 2. We measure the polarization of
trajectories of a single photon (photon 1) are measured, postselected photon 2 in two different bases and postselect the measurement out-
−3
A B x 10 x 10−3
4 1 1
0.5 0.5
3
v1/c
0
0.5
v1/c
0
2 −0.5
−0.5
−1
1 0 −1
−1.5
−2.5 −2 −1.5 −1 −0.5 0 0.5 1 1.5 −3 −2 −1 0 1 2 3
0 Transverse coordinate [mm] Transverse coordinate [mm]
−0.5
−1
−2 −1
−3
−1.5
−4
2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500 4000 4500 5000 5500 6000
Propagation distance [mm] Propagation distance [mm]
A
4
B |H >
3
Transverse coordinate [mm]
1
|D >
0
−1
−2
−3
−4
2000 3000 4000 5000 6000
Propagation distance [mm]
Fig. 4. Observation of surreal trajectories. (A) The set of reconstructed trajectories for photon 1 without postselection onto a particular polarization of
photon 2, corresponding to the delayed WWM of ESSW. The trajectories are plotted over the range z = 1.7 m to z = 5.9 m, using 67 different planes. A
single trajectory beginning at x = −0.98 mm is plotted with a thicker, colored line. (B) The polarization of photon 2, represented by its Bloch vector, as a
function of the position of photon 1 as it traverses the colored trajectory plotted in (A). The polarization of photon 2 is calculated by performing quantum
state tomography (34) on photon 2 and correlating those counts with the counts observed on the single-photon camera. The photons have been en-
tangled such that if photon 1 were to be found in the lower slit, photon 2 would be vertically polarized. This is the case at the start of the single trajectory
we consider. However, as photon 1 traverses the double slit, it enters a region where the wave function emanating from the upper slit (for which photon 2
is horizontally polarized) interferes with that from the lower slit, leading to nonlocal coupling between the motion of photon 1 and the polarization of
photon 2. As a consequence, the polarization of photon 2 changes over time and its final state no longer faithfully records the WWM information about
photon 1.
the polarization of particle 2, in the three directions (in different runs), To obtain the data for the trajectories, photon 1 was imaged in dif-
conditioned on finding particle 1 at particular positions at particular ferent planes using two fixed lenses (with focal lengths of 10 and 15 cm)
times. The results of this measurement are plotted in Fig. 4. As a func- and a third translatable lens (with a focal length of 2.5 cm) in between
tion of the progress of photon 1 along any trajectory that it may follow, them. The magnification and imaging distance of the imaging system
the state of photon 2 changes. Initially, for a trajectory originating in (consisting of the three lenses and the CCD camera) were determined
the lower slit, photon 2 is found to be vertically polarized (indicating by sweeping the position of the middle lens with one slit blocked and
that the outcome of the WWM was “lower slit”). Further along this the weak measurement calcite removed. The magnification of the system
trajectory, the polarization of photon 2 gradually becomes less vertical- was then given by 1/x, where x is the distance from the imaged spot to
ly polarized and ends up with polarization close to |D〉 (see Fig. 4). Thus, the line of symmetry of the imaging system. The imaging distance as a
a WWM in the H/V basis (or “upper”/“lower” basis) for this photon, function of the lens position was determined by stretching the calibration
at this time, is equally likely to indicate that it came from the upper slit images (by a factor inversely proportional to the magnification) so that
as from the lower slit. the true image can be extracted for each position of the middle lens.
Finally, the width of the spot in the true image was determined, from
which the imaging distance can be determined using Gaussian beam pro-
pagation equations. Note that because Bohmian trajectories do not cross
DISCUSSION in one dimension, these propagation equations also relate the Bohmian
We have verified the effect pointed out by ESSW that for a WWM position of the particle at the plane where the momentum measurement
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26. R. Mir, J. S. Lundeen, M. W. Mitchell, A. M. Steinberg, J. L. Garretson, H. M. Wiseman, A Acknowledgments: We thank C. Simon for useful discussions and B. Braverman for both useful
double-slit ‘which-way’ experiment on the complementarity–uncertainty debate. New J. discussions and helpful code. We also thank A. Stummer for designing the coincidence circuit.
Phys. 9, 287–297 (2007). Funding: D.H.M., L.R., K.F., L.V., K.J.R., and A.S. acknowledge support from the Natural Sciences
27. L. A. Rozema, A. Darabi, D. H. Mahler, A. Hayat, Y. Soudagar, A. M. Steinberg, Violation of and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research.
Heisenberg’s measurement-disturbance relationship by weak measurements. Phys. Rev. D.H.M., L.R., and A.S. acknowledge support from Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems. K.F., L.V.,
Lett. 109, 100404 (2012). and K.J.R. also acknowledge Industry Canada, Canada Research Chairs, the Canada Foundation for
28. M. M. Weston, M. J. W. Hall, M. S. Palsson, H. M. Wiseman, G. J. Pryde, Experimental test of Innovation, and the Ontario Centres of Excellence. D.H.M. acknowledges additional support from the
universal complementarity relations. Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 220402 (2013). Walter C. Sumner Foundation. H.M.W. acknowledges support from the Australian Research Council
29. F. Kaneda, S.-Y. Baek, M. Ozawa, K. Edamatsu, Experimental test of error-disturbance un- Discovery Project DP140100648. Author contributions: D.H.M., L.R., H.M.W., and A.S. designed the
certainty relations by weak measurement. Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 020402 (2014). experiment. D.H.M. and L.R. carried out data collection and analysis. K.F., L.V., and K.J.R. constructed
30. J. Dressel, C. J. Broadbent, J. C. Howell, A. N. Jordan, Experimental violation of two- and operated the source of photon pairs and aided in the alignment of the Pockels cell. All authors
party Leggett-Garg inequalities with semiweak measurements. Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 040402 contributed to writing the paper, including preparing figures. Competing interests: The authors
(2011). declare that they have no competing interests. Data and materials availability: All data needed
31. M. E. Goggin, M. P. Almeida, M. Barbieri, B. P. Lanyon, J. L. O’Brien, A. G. White, G. J. Pryde, to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary
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