photon

From photo- +‎ -on. Coined by American physicist Leonard Troland in 1916 as a unit of light hitting the retina, and later popularized in a more modern sense by Gilbert N. Lewis, with the term gaining acceptance in the physics community by the late 1920s.

• IPA^(key): /ˈfəʊtɒn/

• Audio (Southern England)

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• Rhymes: -əʊtɒn

photon (plural photons)

1. (physics) The quantum of light and other electromagnetic energy, regarded as a discrete particle having zero rest mass, no electric charge, and an indefinitely long lifetime. It is a gauge boson.
   • 2013 July-August, Fenella Saunders, “Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture”, in American Scientist:

     The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.

• phonon
• plasmon

• Hopton, notoph

• IPA^(key): /fɔ.tɔ̃/

• Audio (Paris)

  (file)

• Audio

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photon m (plural photons)

1. (physics) photon

• “photon”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.