QM Spins Program Documents

Main Document

QM Spins Program 

written by Wolfgang Christian

The QM Spins program simulates the quantum-mechanical measurement of spin-1/2 and spin-1 particles.  The default simulation shows the result of measuring the z component of spin on a beam of spin-1/2 particles with a random (or statistical) mixture of spin orientations.  Additional initial states and other measurements can be specified using the Design and/or Initialize menu items.  

QM Spins is one of 5 Open Source Physics programs that model quantum mechanical measurement.  It is distributed as a ready-to-run (compiled) Java archive.  Double clicking the qm_spins.jar file will run the program if Java is installed.  The original program, Spins, was written for the Macintosh by Daniel Schroeder and Thomas Moore and was then ported to Java by David McIntyre.  We have made extensive modifications to the Java version of the SPINS program.  Additional Open Source Physics programs for quantum mechanics are available.  They can be found by searching ComPADRE for Open Source Physics, OSP, or Superposition.

Last Modified May 15, 2008

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