In physics and chemistry, wave–particle duality is the concept that all energy (and thus all matter) exhibits both wave-like and particle-like properties. Being a central concept of quantum mechanics, this duality addresses the inadequacy of classical concepts like "particle" and "wave" in fully describing the behavior of quantum-scale objects. Orthodox interpretations of quantum mechanics explain this ostensible paradox as a fundamental property of the Universe, while alternative interpretations explain the duality as an emergent, second-order consequence of various limitations of the observer. This treatment focuses on explaining the behavior from the perspective of the widely used Copenhagen interpretation.
Wave–particle duality should be distinguished from wave–particle complementarity, the latter being an extension of the duality. Complementarity states that, within the base concept that all classical waves are composed of quanta/particles exhibiting the overall wave pattern and all particles behave as waves according to the de Broglie wavelength, these "wavicles" exhibit a freedom to behave in more "wave-like" or more "particle-like" manners (these behaviors being mutually exclusive).
The idea of duality originated in a debate over the nature of light and matter dating back to the 1600s, when competing theories of light were proposed by Christiaan Huygens and Isaac Newton: light was thought either to consist of waves (Huygens) or of corpuscles/particles (Newton). Through the work of Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Louis de Broglie, Arthur Compton, and many others, current scientific theory holds that all particles also have a wave nature (and vice versa).[1] This phenomenon has been verified not only for elementary particles, but also for compound particles like atoms and even molecules. In fact, according to traditional formulations of non-relativistic quantum mechanics, wave–particle duality applies to all objects, even macroscopic ones; but because of their small wavelengths, the wave properties of macroscopic objects cannot be detected.[2]
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