Natural Science Forum / Physics / Research / March 2005

Okay, let me start off by saying that I haven't studied QED.  That being
said, I know enough about mechanics to know you're looking at this in
the completely wrong way.  Photons carry energy and momentum.  If a
photon collides with an electron, it will impart momentum to it, not
cause the electron to move a certain distance and then stop.  This is in
line with what we know about classical fields, which continually cause
the momentum of a particle influenced by them to change.

Of course, in any quantum field theory, we'll have to be dealing with
probabilities and perturbations, so it's not like a photon is just going
to suddenly appear every time the two electrons are a certain specific
distance apart.  You're going to get something a lot more complicated
than two electrons that come toward eachother on linear trajectories,
stop at a certain distance, then reverse direction.  How complicated?  I
don't know, maybe someone who knows something about QED will step in.

But in short, the impulse gained from a single photon hitting an
electron should be enough to move the electrons infinitely far apart
gvien enough time, provided no other forces are acting on them.