Hanbury Brown and Twiss effect

In physics, the Hanbury Brown and Twiss (HBT) effect is any of a variety of correlation and anti-correlation effects in the intensities received by two detectors from a beam of particles. HBT effects can generally be attributed to the wave–particle duality of the beam, and the results of a given experiment depend on whether the beam is composed of fermions or bosons. Devices which use the effect are commonly called intensity interferometers and were originally used in astronomy, although they are also heavily used in the field of quantum optics.

History

In 1954, Robert Hanbury Brown and Richard Q. Twiss introduced the intensity interferometer concept to radio astronomy for measuring the tiny angular size of stars, suggesting that it might work with visible light as well. Soon after they successfully tested that suggestion: in 1956 they published an in-lab experimental mockup using blue light from a mercury-vapor lamp, and later in the same year, they applied this technique to measuring the size of Sirius. In the latter experiment, two photomultiplier tubes, separated by a few meters, were aimed at the star using crude telescopes, and a correlation was observed between the two fluctuating intensities. Just as in the radio studies, the correlation dropped away as they increased the separation (though over meters, instead of kilometers), and they used this information to determine the apparent angular size of Sirius.

This result was met with much skepticism in the physics community. The radio astronomy result was justified by Maxwell's equations, but there were concerns that the effect should break down at optical wavelengths, since the light would be quantised into a relatively small number of photons that induce discrete photoelectrons in the detectors. Many physicists worried that the correlation was inconsistent with the laws of thermodynamics.