近日，奥地利维也纳大学物理系的Lee A. Rozema课题组与德国汉堡大学的Milan Radonji合作，在实验中观测到非线性三缝的高阶干涉现象。相关成果已于2023年3月13日在国际学术期刊《物理评论A》上发表。

该研究团队通过实验证明了非线性演化实际上可以导致高阶干涉。在该实验中，高阶干涉可以使用一个简单的经典或量子描述来理解，即光学相干态在非线性介质中相互作用。该项工作表明，非线性演化可能会为试图通过排除高阶干涉来验证玻恩法则的实验提供一种漏洞。

据悉，两束波之间的干涉是物理学中一个众所周知的概念，将其推广到两个以上的波也很容易。干涉阶数被定义为在干涉中不可简化为更低阶干涉图案的路径数。在实际中，二阶干涉意味着在三缝实验中，当所有三个缝都打开时，干涉图案可以通过所有可能的两个缝之间的干涉图案来预测。通常认为，量子力学只表现出二阶干涉。然而，这只在特定假设下成立，通常是单个粒子经历线性演化。

附：英文原文

Title: Experimental higher-order interference in a nonlinear triple slit

Author: Peter Namdar, Philipp K. Jenke, Irati Alonso Calafell, Alessandro Trenti, Milan Radonji, Borivoje Daki, Philip Walther, Lee A. Rozema

Issue&Volume: 2023/03/13

Abstract: Interference between two waves is a well-known concept in physics, and its generalization to more than two waves is straightforward. The order of interference is defined as the number of paths that interfere in a manner that cannot be reduced to patterns of a lower order. In practice, second-order interference means that in, say, a triple-slit experiment, the interference pattern when all three slits are open can be predicted from the interference patterns between all possible pairs of slits. Quantum mechanics is often said to only exhibit second-order interference. However, this is only true under specific assumptions, typically single particles undergoing linear evolution. Here we experimentally show that nonlinear evolution can in fact lead to higher-order interference. The higher-order interference in our experiment can be understood using a simple classical or quantum description, namely optical coherent states interacting in a nonlinear medium. Our work shows that nonlinear evolution could open a loophole for experiments attempting to verify Born's rule by ruling out higher-order interference.

DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.107.032211

Source: https://journals.aps.org/pra/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevA.107.032211