Aharonov–Bohm effect
Efecto Aharonov-Bohm
- Date
- 1959 · confidence high
- Place
- Bristol, England, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- Yakir Aharonov and David Bohm
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What was discovered
Aharonov, as Bohm's student in Bristol, predicted that a charged particle can undergo a phase shift due to an electromagnetic potential even though it never crosses a region with an electric or magnetic field, showing that potentials have their own physical reality.
Werner Ehrenberg and Raymond Siday had already predicted the same effect in 1949, unknown to Aharonov and Bohm; once aware, they acknowledged it in a 1961 paper.
What it led to
- Reconsideration of the physical status of electromagnetic potentials
- Direct experimental proof of the gauge principle
- Applications in quantum interferometry and nanoelectronics