Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 109, Issue 48, Pages 19575-19578Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1211209109
Keywords
light harvesting; quantum coherence; incoherent light; 2D photon echo; retinal
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Funding
- US Air Force Office of Scientific Research [FA9550-10-1-0260]
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council
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Photoinduced biological processes occur via one-photon absorption in natural light, which is weak, continuous wave, and incoherent, but are often studied in the laboratory using pulsed coherent light. Here, we compare the response of a molecule to these two very different sources within a quantized radiation field picture. The latter is shown to induce coherent time evolution in the molecule, whereas the former does not. As a result, the coherent time dependence observed in the laboratory experiments will not be relevant to the natural biological process. Emphasis is placed on resolving confusions regarding this issue that are shown to arise from aspects of quantum measurement and from a lack of appreciation of the proper description of the absorbed photon.
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