Robert Gilmore
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Science and the Photon
It was Albert Einstein who first theorized that the energy in a light beam exists in small bits or particles, and scientists today know that light sometimes behaves like a wave (somewhat like sound or water) and sometimes like a stream of particles. The energies of photons range from high-energy gamma rays and X-rays down to low-energy infrared and radio waves, though all travel at the same speed. The amazing power of lasers is the result of a concentration of photons that have been made to travel together in order to hit their target at the same time.
Examples of photon in a Sentence
Stephen J. Beard, USA TODAY, 18 May 2024
And the dye will then absorb the photons, excite electrons that are injected into the titanium dioxide layer and then collected by the anode and then conducted out to the cable.
—IEEE Spectrum, 15 May 2024
Information gets sent out over fiber optic cables as photons.
—Dylan Sloan, Fortune, 12 May 2024
In theory, the ethereal dark matter will occasionally absorb a photon from the strong magnetic field and convert it into a microwave photon, which an experiment can detect.
—Lyndie Chiou, Quanta Magazine, 7 May 2024
The on-chip photon waveguides need to be lower loss.
—The Physics Arxiv Blog, Discover Magazine, 30 Apr. 2024
For example, the on-chip photon detectors that are built into waveguides need to be able to count individual photons.
—The Physics Arxiv Blog, Discover Magazine, 30 Apr. 2024
The simulated black hole's event horizon is about 16 million miles wide, and viewers will see a large flat cloud of hot gas and glowing structures called photon rings.
—Kerry Breen, CBS News, 7 May 2024
Cloud structures called photon rings and a flat, swirling cloud of hot, glowing gas called an accretion disk surrounding the black hole serve as a visual reference during the fall.
—Eric Lagatta, USA TODAY, 7 May 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'photon.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near photon
Cite this Entry
“Photon.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/photon. Accessed 23 May. 2024.
Copy CitationKids Definition
photon
noun
Medical Definition
photon
noun
called also troland
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