On the Doppler effect for photons in rotating systems

Abstract

The analysis of the Doppler effect for photons in rotating systems, studied using the Mössbauer effect, confirms the general conclusions of a previous paper dedicated to experiments with photons emitted/absorbed by atoms/nuclei in inertial flight. The wave theory of light is so deeply rooted that it continues to be applied to describe phenomena in which the fundamental entities at work are discrete (photons). The fact that the wave theory of light can describe one aspect of these phenomena should not overshadow two issues: the corpuscular theory of light, first applied to the Doppler effect for photons by Schrödinger in 1922, is by far more complete since it describes all of the features of the studied phenomena; the wave theory can only be used when the number of photons at work is statistically significant. This disregarding of basic methodological criteria may appear to be a minor fault. However, the historical development of quantum physics shows that the predominance of the wave theory of radiation, beyond its natural application domain, has hampered the reorientation toward the photon description of the underlying phenomena.