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Is there any theoretical end to the electromagnetic spectrum…

Qmechanic
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1 Answers1

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In theory, the electromagnetic spectrum should extend indefinitely without limit.

You can create an electromagnetic wave with arbitrarily long or short wavelength, and therefore arbitrarily low or high frequency respectively, by accelerating a charged particle back and forth.

Of course the amount of energy required to accelerate a charge back and forth with any extremely high frequency will be limited to how much energy you have available. So with that, the upper bound of the electromagnetic spectrum will be limited to your supply of energy. That being said, the frequency corresponding to the total energy in the universe may be the true upper bound, in principle.

As for the other extreme, in principle, a vanishingly low enough energy such that the wavelength would perhaps be bounded by the Hubble sphere.

joseph h
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