Spontaneous collapse: A solution to the measurement problem and a source of the decay in mesonic systems

Abstract

Dynamical reduction models propose a solution to the measurement problem in quantum mechanics: the collapse of the wave function becomes a physical process. We compute the predictions to decaying and flavor-oscillating neutral mesons for the two most promising collapse models, the QMUPL (Quantum Mechanics with Universal Position Localization) model and the mass-proportional CSL (Continuous Spontaneous Localization) model. Our results are showing (i) a strong sensitivity to the very assumptions of the noise field underlying those two collapse models and (ii) under particular assumptions the CSL case allows even to recover the decay dynamics. This in turn allows to predict the effective collapse rates solely based on the measured values for the oscillation (mass differences) and the measured values of the decay constants. The four types of neutral mesons (Kmeson, D-meson, B d -meson, Bs-meson) lead surprisingly to ranges comparable to those put forward by Adler (2007) and Ghirardi-Rimini-Weber (1986). Our results show that these systems at high energies are very sensitive to possible modifications of the standard quantum theory making them a very powerful laboratory to rule out certain collapse scenarios and studying the detailed physical processes solving the measurement problem.

Comment on “Spontaneous collapse: A solution to the measurement problem and a source of the decay in mesonic systems”

“…The preturbative results given in equations (16) and (17) of [1] agree with this straightforward exact computation for θ(0) = 1/2. To compute the transition probabilities between particle and anti-particle states, we need to solve the ME (6).…”

“…where i goes from 1 to 3 andq i is the measurement operator for the space coordinate i. With this model, the objective of [1] is to compute the transition probabilities between mass-eigenstates and between particle and anti-particule states. The transition probabilities between mass-eigenstates are actually trivial to compute from the very first equation (1).…”

“…With this model, the objective of [1] is to compute the transition probabilities between mass-eigenstates and between particle and anti-particule states. The transition probabilities between mass-eigenstates are actually trivial to compute from the very first equation (1). Indeed, it is immediate to see that the stochastic evolution for pure states does not mix different mass eigenstates (and is norm preserving by construction).…”

“…The principal objective of [1] is to compute transition * antoine.tilloy@mpq.mpg.de probabilities of the form:…”

Can a spontaneous collapse in flavour oscillations be tested at KLOE?

“…Furthermore, a fully new interpretation of the dynamics can be obtained [32]. The decay rates can be fully derived as an effect of the collapse.…”