Photonics

What Happens If You Slice a Photon in Half? Three Physicists Say You Get a Rainbow

Three Norwegian physicists propose that slicing a photon in half does not result in two smaller photons, but rather a rainbow. This phenomenon is explained by the nonlinear interaction of light with matter, where a sharp change in the photon's state (like a mirror being removed mid-reflection) requires a broader spectrum of frequencies to represent it, effectively creating new photons across different frequencies.