Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-relativity-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2019/section-a/1/solution

The conserved initial four-momentum of a particle with positive rest mass satisfies . A single photon instead has null four-momentum, . Four-momentum conservation for an isolated one-body decay would require , contradicting these Lorentz invariants. Thus decay into a single photon is impossible in every inertial frame.
Equivalently, the incoming energy and momentum obey , whereas a single outgoing photon obeys . Changing the laboratory speed cannot change this mismatch of the invariant mass shell.

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