Is the wave superposition necessary for the interference phenomenology?

Abstract

The wave superposition is considered the phenomenological principle of light interference, as well as an accurate procedure to calculate the quantum probability of the buildup of single matter particle interference patterns. However, it cannot provide a unified phenomenological framework to explain both types of interference. In this paper, a unified framework is proposed which leads to a unique principle for interference of both light waves and single matter particles. It is shown that the term interference denotes the confinement of the light irradiance or the single matter particles in spatially structured Lorentzian wells, due to the geometric potential determined by the prepared non-locality at the mask plane. This new description does not resort to the assumption of wave superposition, so that the setup configuration plays the main role.