What is Quantum Tunneling?
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Minute Physics provides an energetic and entertaining view of old and new problems in physics -- all in a minute!
In this episode we explain what quantum tunneling is and how it works! To see quantum tunneling in action, watch bit.ly/pJhIdW and learn about the sun!
Music by Nathaniel Schroeder
youtube: bit.ly/pakJLE
myspace: mysp.ac/qtmZQj Created by Henry Reich
You gave an analogy of what quantum tunneling is, but still didn't really explain what it actually is.
sweetness583the quantum world is based on probability, not normalcy so say im at hershy park, 5 years ago. im obviously not tall enough to go to the bigger rides, so normally I would only go to the rides I am tall enough to go on. however, theres a really cool ride I would really want to be on, with a huge line. (quantum tunneling here: ) So I cut the line and pretend to be tall enough and ride. so theres a a high chance of seeing me at a 7- ride, a low chance to see me on the ride or in line now swap out big ride w/ higher energy state, small rides w/ low energy state, me with a particle, and height w/ my energy state
sweetness583 Well, from this video I got that elemental particles "like" to be in a state of lowest energy.
I'm guessing that those slopes represent potentials in a quantum field, so elemental particles like electrons will "want" to go to the lowest point even if they can't... Chances are that they won't get there, for the most part, but in rare occasions they'll be able to.
I'm guessing that, in order to get there, they'll need to increase their energy state to "climb the slope", and then drop it in order to "fall" to the lowest energy state... if they aren't able to increase their energy state, they won't "climb that slope", that's why they normally won't get to "the other side".
But, in rare occasions, particles will ignore this, they'll get to the lowest energy state without increasing their energy state/"climbing the slope" first...they'll go through the slope, therefore: quantum tunneling.
I probably said some ridiculous stuff, but that's what I'm getting from the video...
Am I totally wrong?
Mr. Pasta Thanks that was a good explanation!
nachoexpo yw ^_^
Goreuncle This helped me understand the video a lot more, thank you.
Came here because of In a Nutshell - Kurzgesagt. Came with tons of questions. Left with more.
What a coincidence! I came here exactly for the same thing too!
Quantum physics pisses me off.
CS:GO player XD
SAME!!
Your answer is God. Jkjk, I am not one of those dumbass
Go home electron, you're drunk.
I am not drunk
"Officer I /was/ home the moment you fired your speedometer ray at me"
at least he isn't driving
so wheres the Quantum tunneling part?
please take two minutes but explain a bit more on topics like these
Siraj Qazi I watched this cause somehow a pine needle ended up in between my rear windshield and the brake light on my Camry. i sent a photo to my friend saying "How did a pine needle end up here?" he replied with "It quantum tunneled" and still, I don't know how it got there... Whatever.
+Jimmy Curtin lol, in simple words (like, very simple :D), tunneling the the occurrence of such an event which is against probability of occurrence..
thanx for your reply
I just spent like 3 hours reading wiki pages on quantum mechanics and i feel disappointed in the simplicity of this "tunneling." basically the particle/photon can go through a barrier 1-3 nm thick. I like to think of it as a bulletproof vest that someone shot with a 9mm and for whatever magical reason, they scored a critical shot and the round penetrated the vest. their really isn't anymore explanation other than complex math.
for physics, I need an hour, not a minute.
@dk bruh oh. My mistake
@dk bruh glad you had a laugh though
That's how I explain all my lost golf balls: they quantum tunnelled themselves into the dirt
NOT GOLF BALLS! SUBATOMIC PARTICLES!
So if I don't want to be with my wife there's a very very high chance I might get divorced...but there's also a very low chance that I might be able to get a side girl. However there's a very very low chance that I get two wives and manage to hide from both that they exist!!
Wow quantum tunneling is impressive
There's a low chance but scenario 3 is possible!! Bcoz probablilty!
@@davidbennett3153 Golf balls are made of subatomic particles.
There are two things a lot of people don’t understand about quantum tunnelling:
1) It’s basically phasing. Like, when superheroes walk through walls, which is really awesome.
2) It’s extremely unlikely to happen in most cases. Like, less likely than 1/1 000 000 000. That’s why we don’t see this happening in everyday scenarios.
So, in this video, the ball might phase through the mountain, but it’s INCREDIBLY unlikely.
Great video, as always! Keep up the good work!
I don't think you know what you are talking about
@@ErDreiwen Yeah, 3 years ago when I wrote this comment I honestly didn’t know what I was talking about.
Pretty sure thats not how it works. A ball will never ever quantum tunnel. Nor has this happened in history. Its called quantum because it happens at the smallest scales.
@@buckyball2003explain it now man I have exam tomorrow
What u were doing 3 years
@@buckyball2003that's character development
These videos are rather lacking in information, another 30sec might have helped.
+Daniel Stevens more like another 30 minutes
+The sky is falling because tomatoes are really annoying. Dude, it's only minute physics.
+The sky is falling because tomatoes are really annoying. More like another 30 hours. Per semester :p
1hr of solving PDE
It is impossible to explain something as complicated as quantum tunneling in such a brief amount of time. These videos are here to interest you in the subject by giving you the bare minimum and encouraging you to do more research by yourself.
Quite awesome how he managed to explain quantum tunneling so simply even without saying quantum tunneling.
For anyone confused a simple way to put it is that the 'ball' tunnels through the 'mountain' or rolls over it by borrowing energy from surrounding particles in which it pays it back by making the reflected electrons more energetic than they would have been originally.
If you are satisfied with this explanation then you weren't really asking any questions.
So when the chicken in minecraft glitches out from the room, it isn't a bug :D
But the chicken isn´t a quantom particle
"If you can't explain it simply, then you simply don't understand it well enough." - Einstein
The Rationalist literally quantum mechanics
The Rationalist #ROASTED
This isn't about the video maker knowing it, I want to know it. By which I mean I want the complicated way.
Very Small things going through stuff
Electron inside nucleus: "Sup guys"
quantum mechanics is always the most fascinating part of physics, in my opinion. until you observe something, every possible conclusion is true about it all at once. until you actually read this comment, it could say anything or nothing at all. in fact, while you are looking at this comment, according to quantum mechanics, a giant purple elephant is technically behind you right now as well as not existing. until you looks, that is always true.
Damn.
MClightOfDay I found your elephant.
Sorry, but Quantum can't be applied like that in the Macro wor...HOLY WHAT'S THAT ELEPHANT DOING THERE?
Matthew Abazis I know it can't, mostly, it's just my way of describing it, similar to Schroedinger's Cat, just more fun (in my opinion)
Well the rarity of that elephant appearing is ver WHAT THE HECK IS THAT ELEPHANT DOING IN MY HOUSE?! still, its very rare, that danged elephant won't appear for a long time. and I'm happy because of that. phew, still breathing....
Go home electrons, you're drunk!
For those who don't understand:
The valley and the mountain are metaphors for the energy barrier needed to perform chemical reactions. Basically, every chemical reaction needs a certain amount of energy (usually heat) to be added into the system (what contains the reaction) in order for the reaction to occur. When we talk about reactions "giving off" or "absorbing" energy, we are talking about the net, or total, amount of energy exchanged in the system.
Thanks for telling this to us and then not explaining shit about how it works.
Ethan Salie probability duh (as far as we know, we don't have specific natural laws
Well the electron wants to releass more energy,theres a potential energy loss on the other side so a probability chance of phasing through another particle to lose energy
This video taught me nothing.
SuperNikio2 lol
Well...that explained nothing
The process is known as “electron capture” and it is an important mode of radioactive decay. In electron capture, an atomic electron is absorbed by a proton in the nucleus, turning the proton into a neutron.
So a seed is absorbed by an egg in uterus turning the egg into a baby.
Like that?
Best wishes to all!
He makes physics and other sciency stuff more easier to understand
Thank you or all your videos I'm an 8th grade student and studying physics.
I'm not really sure I learned anything other than assumption.
Welcome to theoretical physics.
epicdude61388 feeling ya!
epicdude61388
Does this theory also means that if I throw a ball on a wall, some of it might go through the wall? just for general understanding :)
shai roemi *Actual physicists brace for armchair physics* No. The only reason counter-intuitive things such as quantum tunneling occurs is the wave-particle duality of matter. Simply put, the occurrences at the quantum level are so complex and rapid we can't really completely rule out anything. A ball being thrown at a wall, however, is a trivial system with a trivial outcome. If it were a single elementary particle undergoing massive changes (nuclear fission/fussion) anything could happen.
Wow funny how this video was released on my birthday before sophomore high school year where I pretty much started to realize, “ok so last year was annoying by how no one would seem to be paying as much attention to their education, so I’m going to prove them wrong THIS year and this is EXACTLY how I’m going to do it.” “No detours or delays.”
Of course, saying something is governed by the rules of probability and leaving it at that is saying we don't know what's going on; we don't know what the physical parts are and we don't know how they interact, but here's the results that we can see.
I think this helped a ton. People who say otherwise are probably using your video alone to understand- and that obviously is very un-intelligent. This is a perfect supplement
Could you make a video about string theory? it's very hard for me to comprehend, still I have much knowledge of it, I would like to know more. For those who don't know string theory is, strings (not silk strings, strings that are close to at least 50x smaller than an electron, at least) tie together to create the Universe, space, time, and the cosmos itself. (I'm not so sure about time) It still confuses me. that's all I know.
I think he's already told what string theory is. In one of the dimension video or something he said the world could be entirely made of with only one dimension. Check out that video.
So basically the universe is made up of one dimensional string.
Love minutephysics, but this just made me more confused. Make a longer vid next time pls😇
It would have been nice to hear an explanation of what energies are involved and how they relate to the particle "tunneling" through another medium. Does the particle lose energy when it tunnels through something or does it remain the same after it has passed through?
I would assume it gains and loses momentum before its final destination
you should have named this video something else. Not to dunderestimate your work but it gives the wrong idea that you're actually gonna explain it.
Its asking YOU
No problem, good luck with your studies, maths and physics are great fields! Have fun!
My brain just exploded
Rip
Since electrons exhibits a wavelike characteristic, it has a wave function. This function is like any function. But this can be used to find its velocity, momentum and other properties. But more importantly you can square it (well it's a complex function so you multiply it by the complex conjugate - this means you get a real answer) to find its probability of being somewhere at some time. Since the wavefunction will exist beyond the barrier there is a chance it will be there because it behaves like a wave. You'd use the schrodinger equation to solve for the wavefunction on the other side (lower potential energy - this is a term in the schrodinger equation) and you could then use this to solve for the probability.
+AlchemistOfNirnroot So what is the probability that the electron will be inside the nucleus? How much of the time is it expected to be there? I would expect that it has a very low probability.
My brain melted faster than the Chernobyl meltdown...
Didnt expect to encounter this on a channel for physics. This is from Jiskefet, a series of dutch satirical sketches, honestly one of the best shows there is in comedy
How can there be an electron in the nucleus?
Hahah oh man you are giving me such a good laugh watching you struggle for some way to feel good about yourself.
"chill lmao" ~Ghandi
***** Wow we hare real keyboard knight here! watch your asses!
to answer your question electro cat, quantum particles are not really solid, they're more like a localized cloud of energy, which is why their "locations" are predicted using statistics of where they mostly are. this means that sometimes, just because the universe likes to complicate things, the electron gas could "thins out" a lot and randomly "re-denses" somewhere other then the location it was before simply because the energy cloud wants to be there. This is usually someplace close by, but sometimes the "the energy cloud" finds its way into a nucleus and "re-denses" there, because the energy tried to "go through the nucleus, and got lost", kind of like a water running through a tea towel and some of it gets trapped inside. Although my understand of this is not stellar, so if this is incorrect someone please feel free to correct me and if you are a physicist and I am correct please take the 2 seconds to confirm what I said so electrocat can have his question answered.
I understand particle location statistics and all that, but I just thought that the electromagnetic repulsion of the positively charge nucleus on the negative electron cloud would prevent the electron from being within the nucleus.
Something gives me the feeling that the laws of quantum physics, when considered at a bigger level, form the laws of classical physics. I think there’s some important relation, such as in binomials and how the small parts form a bigger whole and that whole, with other wholes, create a bigger whole. Maybe when you consider classical physics at an even immensely large level the laws change and can be predicted
This is why when I drop my pen I find it on the other side of the room instead of on the floor where i dropped it!
Think about this... I was on the deck of a big ship that was connected to the shore by a giant, 4-inch-thick electrical cable. The cable itself was only about 1-inch in diameter, but there was so much current traveling through the copper cable, that it was wrapped with several inches of resistant rubber insulation.
Then... while I was standing on the deck of the ship, I reached up and grabbed the giant, rubber, insulated cable, I felt a bit of an electrical shock. Why? Because a few of the the excited electrons "tunneled" or (quite literally, teleported) through the insulation and into my body. In the strictest sense, the electrons ceased to exist on one side of the rubber insulation, and instantly existed on the other side... trying their best to make their way to the path of least resistance. Physics, man... crazy stuff!
Quantum tunnelling is what the government does to your pay check.
THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING SOCKS HAS BEEN DISCOVERED
That made no sonse to me
I'm not sm-sm- smart anymore
did you drive a "for two" and get in an accident?
Which is good, because I only have a basic understanding of physics right now. He's stated that his goal is to simplify things enough to really teach and share them, rather than just to review them.
Yeah, that video is really only an analogy & pretty useless as an explanation. I reckon you could do a proper job in the same time using the uncertainty principle & possibly cramming in wave particle duality.
COMMON SENSE: Hey, you can't-do that!
PARTICLE: Oh yeah?
COMMON SENSE: *MAKES PARTICLE HAVE COMMON SENSE*
I'm a fan of your videos but this one in particular didn't explain anything.
It's like a friend your can't lose but still can lose and you find him everywhere and nowhere at the same time
didnt explain anything.
You should've introduced a little bit about wave functions and other stuff correlated to quantum tunneling, or this will seem very confusing to people who are new to this idea.
That atom at the end...which one is it?
So, looked at it, its oxygen, but there's 9 neutrons but 8 protons. :/
michelle bertsch Yeah so its Oxygen-17.
***** depends on your attitude
michelle bertsch 10 neutrons actually
I think O-18 is radioactive...
And with an electron in the middle,
it would just split into pieces.
Because the atomic nucleus has a pull of those electrons, which exhibit an overall pattern of electron density around the nucleus. It's most concentrated at some ideal distance around the nucleus, but can exhibit distances closer or further than the ideal distance around the nucleus (extremely, extremely rare to find them too far or too close than the ideal)
I came here because Science Studio made a ideo about "why are CPUs getting hot"
yeah same!
I know why! It's because our simulations of virtual people are getting better. Basically a CPU is eating all those bytes that that virtual person is made of and spitting it out in some way all the time! And of course we all know that "you are what you eat". And since in general people want hotter virtual people, CPUs get hotter too! Ain't cience beartofu?
you're totally right. Ff you want to understand something, do some research. However, I do understand their point of view. This guy explains this information in a great way that makes it simple to understand, and that's why people like it.
sooooo.......... what IS quantum tunneling?
Its pretty much PHASING through solid objects when the atoms of that object doesnt touch the atoms of the other object.
We also have the opposite effect "non-classical reflection" where the particle has more than enough energy to pass the barrier, but just doesn't.
i really find this hard to believe.
The whole theory of probability is just another poor attempt to explain sub atomic particles behavior.
The thousands of variables that we aren't considering is electron is subject to interference from itself as well as other waves and particles that stretch across the entire universe.
Actually, we've SEEN this happen. Its so easy to sit on our but and critisize when their not the ones slaving away for years to learn more about our universe.
Define "seen".
Observation,study. Heres an example to name one.www.techtimes.com/articles/8545/20140616/quantum-tunnel-effect-studied-in-unique-experiment-by-austrian-scientists.htm
that is why they decided to shoot one particle at a time to prove there was no interference.
well since you just made a rash generalization of scientists, i'm going to make a rash generalization about people like you... i think some people, just don't WANT to believe how probability is intertwined with our reality,because it makes our preconceptions seem foolish, and it flies in the face of common sense, that, and for the religious, it makes the idea of God seem really really silly.
These videos are awesome even if u already know what he's talking about :)
go home electron you're drunk.
Thanks for reminding me why I majored in physics, minutephysics man.
so what you are really saying is, quantum mechanics does not make any sense!
Based on this example with no prior knowledge, I would assume quantum tunneling is when a ball (quanta) uncharacteristically 'tunnels' through a mountain (barrier it shouldn't physically overcome) to either get on the other side, or in rare cases end up in the middle of the mountain (nucleus of an atom)
anyone here from nerdist?
I'd have classified this video as a particle in a square well but I can't think of a better example of Q' tunnelling from a classical point of view. Nice job
This is a really bad example lol.
It’s sense. Or was that a joke
I looked up this video after reading a section in a book. The example given was throwing a tennis ball at a wall that was too tall to throw over but thin enough for the ball to possibly go thru. Conventional physics would tell us the ball would encounter the barrier and stop. Quantum particles are able to appear on the other side of the wall though. This book remarked that it wasn’t that particles forced their way thru the barrier, but that they were already there. I just saw that double split experiment where electrons flowed thru both slits simultaneously , only when they put up measuring devices, the electrons would cease to flow through both at once and instead go thru just one. It also mentioned that the protons in the sun, all being positively charged, should theoretically be repulsed so strongly that the force to join them is impossible but gravitational pressure pushes them together and quantum particles are allowed to pass thru causing nuclear fusion, generating helium and therefore energy.
Yes. The illustration was constructed for simplicity's sake, but the particle can tunnel in ANY direction ... I'm just not sure how far away it would be allowed to tunnel since it was last observed.
Short answer - it wont hang around for long. Most likely is that it would be emmited from the nucleus, however it could also interact with the protons and in some very rare situations with the neutrons. In almost all proton electron interactions of this type the electron would be "captured" (look up K-capture) in which case the proton would turn to a neutron, the atom would change element as it now has one less proton, and the nucleus would emit a neutrino (the remnant of the electron).
In short, when certain classical forces become stronger or weaker and can overtake the ones they usually cant. Like the electron in the nucleus, the electromagnetic field REALLY wants that electron with the protons, especially because the Strong force keeps the protons together as a crumb in the middle. If the outest valence wants to give up electrons, sometimes a probability that it will shoot down a level hard than the strong force, in turn launch the innermost electron into the core.
Since there is only a certain degree of certainty the position and momentum of a particle can be known, wave functions for particles are developed to better understand the probability of a particle being in a certain place. Upon analysis of the wave function it can be seen that there is a chance that the particle will be in a location that it doesnt have enough energy to be in. If a particle is farther than a point that it has enough energy to reach then it "tunneled" through the energy barrier.
So Quantum Tunneling isn’t actuall wormholes or portals appearing randomly, it’s just a chance that something will be somewhere else because it’s better for it?
Awesome, just as crazy. I'm surprised this one gets no attention...
actually quantum tunneling is defined as "a quantum mechanical process in which a particle when faced with a barrier has no means of surmounting it.so actually it means that the ball has no means of getting to the other side because of the conservation of energy but if influenced by an external force, I.e a more powerful push, its chances of getting there would be higher. (please note: this is how I understood the video, correct me if im wrong.)
I'm a year 8 and I have no idea what this guy's talking about.
But I love him teaching things.. O.o
What I like about this is that since the universe is so big and old, this has probably happened thousands of times before now, somewhere. An innocent little electron has been on its merry way, somewhere in the deepest depths of space and suddenly has disappeared and popped up millions of lightyears away. I like that thought.
The wave function actually is non-zero within the barrier -- and usually, it's actually more likely to be found at an arbitrary spot within the barrier than it is at an arbitrary spot beyond the barrier.
Electrons are usually in orbitals, quantum tunneling is where the electron would kinda be (you can guess it) Sometimes the electron can be somewhere you don't expect and you might see that in forms of lines on a monitor that is attached to a spectrometer. So if you see something funky, it could be quantum tunneling
I was looking for a really short video on the topic. This was perfect, thanks!
Two particles can't occupy the same quantum state, which means that two indistinguishable particles can't occupy the same space. But if two particles with a different charge or spin or whatever (for example, an electron spinning one direction and an electron spinning the other direction) can occupy the same space, as long as they are distinguishable in one other way.
An effect that comes to work in a STM or why the sun doesn't burn up it's fuel in a few seconds. Very cool!
I was trying to think of something funny about that electron but then I read this. You nailed it. THUMBS UP!
makes sense, all that would have to happen is that the protons and neutrons would have to wiggle around a little bit and leave some room for the electron to go in, then there just has to be a random electron to go in there. same thing with the mountain, the solid rock just has to wiggle around a little bit to make room for the ball.
I believe it was Niels Bohr who said that if thinking about quantum mechanics doesn't make your head hurt, then you don't understand it. So if your head is hurting right now then that's a good sign.
No, the uncertainty principle says to you that you can't measure the position of the object and the velocity at the same time with the same precision, not that the particle can't be there. In fact, that principle says that the "translation" from quantum mechanics to clasic mechanics is not accurrate because velocity and position are not the same thing...
hour? i can listen to him for days!!
yeah, i got this far too (atomar models was a subject we looked at over and over again... not much fun...). the whole quantum subject is still confusing as hell, but you helped clearing up a bit. so this not-quite teleportation basically just an electron at a very improbable place, but under normal uncertainity conditions.
Are you going to do another video where you actually explain quantum tunneling?
SO INTERESTING!! cant stop watching ur vids
According to classical mechanics, you are right. But in Quantum Mechanics things don't really have a fixed position. In fact, things can get to places without reaching the places in between. That is quantum tunneling, and yes, this seems counter intuitive, and it is, but experiments show that the effect is there, in fact, if it wasn't, the sun could never fuse enough hydrogen to support life (which it clearly does).
There's only 1 minute to convey these things. I would like to think that it could explain Quantum Tunneling but I realize that these videos are better suited to facilitate desire to further investigate, rather than explain anything to a profound level or even an elementary level. I guess that might be obvious but sometimes the obvious is obscured.
I like how videos like this go from point "A" to point "C", without explaining "B". It's like the Underwear Gnomes in South Park. "A: Steal underwear.. B: shrug., C: Profit!" There is actually more to explaining Quantum Tunneling in "B" than in "A" or "C". Quantum Tunneling says that there is an unlikely possibility that the video makers WILL do this.
Wow. I did not understand a word of that. So advanced for me!
Nothing can go faster than light according to the relativity theory, the light always moves at the speed of light but in water it takes twists and turns, making it "slow down" if you compere to when it would reach it's "target" without water. An elektron might ignore that and take the shortest way making it reach it's "target" faster than light, but not traveling faster.
wait till you are year 12, or 14, or year 14+. Keep learning things and it all comes together (it hasn't for me yet but it does make more sense.)
I was always telling myself that i should say i wish this video was longer in the comments but then i realised... Its MINUTEphysics
Quantum tunneling is behavior by matter that is "allowed" by quantum mechanics, but highly improbable. The most probable place for any particle to be is very near the position one would expect from classical physics. But when dealing with the nearly infinite number of particles that make up matter, the chances become good that a small portion will do improbable things. Radioactivity is an example of this phenomenon. Particles jumping through a barrier that should have stopped them is another.
Because the chance of an effect happening is related to the mass and distance over which it happens. So with very light things (like solitary protons) in very tight quarters (like in the suns interior) chances of quantum effects are much greater then on a intuition (macroscopic) scale, which deals with kilograms and meters instead of distances smaller than a nanometer an weights under a nanogram. Because there are also a lot of protons in the suns core, the quantum effects happen very often.
The protons are both positively charged so they want to repel each other. However if they get close enough the strong nuclear force takes over (which is why protons can hang out in nuclei). So in the diagram at 00:36, think of the village at the bottom of the hill as the one proton and the ball as the second one with the hill representing the repulsion of alike charges.
Oh god
>Dimension
>Width
>Fourth
>Science
Now that we got that out of the way: dimension isn't just a synonym for direction. Thank you and have a nice day.
Furthermore, no, electrons and protons would not combine to form a neutron; a neutron is made up of a slightly different arrangement of quarks than a proton, and an electron is a different class of elementary particle entirely (a Lepton as opposed to a quark).
Math helps me sleep. And not because it bores me to sleep, it gives me something to think about so i can fall asleep. So, thank you Henry (that's your name right? I think I remember it)