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In quantum mechanics, the expectation value is the probabilistic expected value of the result (measurement) of an experiment. It can be thought of as an average of all the possible outcomes of a measurement as weighted by their likelihood, and as such it is not the most probable value of a measurement; indeed the expectation value may have zero probability of occurring (e.g. measurements which ...
Expected values can also be used to compute the variance, by means of the computational formula for the variance = [] ( []). A very important application of the expectation value is in the field of quantum mechanics.
Quantum state tomography is a process by which, given a set of data representing the results of quantum measurements, a quantum state consistent with those measurement results is computed. [50] It is named by analogy with tomography , the reconstruction of three-dimensional images from slices taken through them, as in a CT scan .
The Ehrenfest theorem, named after Austrian theoretical physicist Paul Ehrenfest, relates the time derivative of the expectation values of the position and momentum operators x and p to the expectation value of the force = ′ on a massive particle moving in a scalar potential (), [1]
The vacuum expectation value of an operator O is usually denoted by . One of the most widely used examples of an observable physical effect that results from the vacuum expectation value of an operator is the Casimir effect. This concept is important for working with correlation functions in quantum field theory. It is also important in ...
Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory that describes the behavior of nature at and below the scale of atoms. [2]: 1.1 It is the foundation of all quantum physics, which includes quantum chemistry, quantum field theory, quantum technology, and quantum information science. Quantum mechanics can describe many systems that classical physics cannot.
Which definition is most appropriate depends on the expectation values needed for a given calculation. Most of this article uses the most common definition of normal ordering as given above, which is appropriate when taking expectation values using the vacuum state of the creation and annihilation operators.
The phenomenology of quantum physics arose roughly between 1895 and 1915, and for the 10 to 15 years before the development of quantum mechanics (around 1925) physicists continued to think of quantum theory within the confines of what is now called classical physics, and in particular within the same mathematical structures.