Question

Since light can be a wave and a particle, how does it adapt to the different situations here? What I mean here is when is it a wave and when is it particle here?

Answer 1

light behaves as a wave when it is seen as a light wave  that propagates in a medium or vacuum its properties like  wave such as the wave number (k), velocity, amplitude, etc are considered .It  behaves as a particle when you consider  it as  matter that triggers some particle to be excited from the matters, or transfers or receives energy into another matters. The behavior of light as wave is considered  in Electrodynamics, meanwhile it behavior as a particle is considered  in Quantum Physics. Light has particle behavior when it is falling on objects whose size is much smaller compared to wave length of light.(e.g electron proton) and wave behavior when the size of object  becomes similar  to its wave length..

answered by: anonymous