Can photons collide too release energy?
I was thinking about what were to happen if you two flashlights were pointed at each other and the light came on simultaneously. I know the beams would go through each other but what if in a rare instance two photons meet?
More Questions From This User See All
Answers & Comments
Verified answer
Flashlight photons have way too little energy for anything interesting to happen, and flashlight beams way too few photons for anything interesting to happen.
Clasically (i.e. under the Maxwell Equations) photons don't interact. Quantum mechanically however, they do. But ths interaction won't release any energy, since photons themselves are energy, but rather would convert energy (i.e. the photons) temporarily into matter. If you want to go deeper, you might start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-photon_physics
No. Photons have no realistic mass, so a collision between them would be impossible. However, they do interfere with each other.