Alladi Ramakrishnan Hall

Classical optics described in the language of quantum mechanics

Thomas Konrad

School of Chemistry and Physics, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban

Optics and quantum mechanics are closely related branches of physics. Therefore, problems from one of these fields might be solved using methods from the other.
We review an attempt to formulate optics in terms of postulates comparable to the postulates of quantum mechanics which reveals similarities but also differences between both when it comes to measurements. Moreover, we discuss a simple application of operator algebra methods to optics and look at the characterisation of vector beams in terms of entanglement.