From what I known the transition from an excited state to the ground state does take a certain amount of time. I'm not talking about the decay time, but the length of time between the beginning of an electronic transition and the end.
What state is the system in during the transition? For example a transition involving a spin flip. What is the spin during the transition from +1/2 to -1/2?
Thanks
I found an explanation here: http://wtamu.edu/~cbaird/sq/2014/06/18/how-can-an-electron-leap-between-atomic-levels-without-passing-through-all-the-space-in-between/
Apparently an electron can have energy not only of discrete levels, but, as long as it's temporary, also everything in between. During the transition the wave function transforms from one stationary, discrete, energy value to the next.
So if I get this right, the spin actually will be somewhere between +1/2 and -1/2 during such a transition.
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