On the Doppler effect for photons in rotating systems

Abstract

The analysis of the Doppler effect for photons in rotating systems, studied using the M\"ossbauer 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 has been--and currently is--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 can not overshadow two issues: the corpuscular theory of light, firstly applied to the Doppler effect for photons by Schr\"odinger in 1922, is by far more complete since it describes all the features of the studied phenomena; the wave theory can be used only when the number of photons at work is statistically significant. The disregard of basic methodological criteria may appear as 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.