In the new version of the experiment, the scientists forced light to pass through cracks in time, not space.
One of the most extraordinary discoveries in quantum physics is that particles fired at screens with two slots inside can behave like waves and pass through both holes simultaneously. For over 200 years, such experiments with two slits in the screen have shown that particles can behave like waves. In the new version of the experiment, the scientists forced light to pass through cracks in time, not space. The results of this experiment could lead to new, unconventional ways to control light, such as photonic time crystals. Inverse writes that this is what creates patterns in time with light and could be used for super-powerful quantum computers.
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Wave or particle?
The question of whether light is a wave or a particle is very old. In the 18th century, Isaac Newton argued that light consists of particles, while his contemporary Christian Huygens suggested that light travels in waves. In 1801, British physicist Thomas Young developed an experiment with two slits in the screen. The results showed that light passing through two parallel slits close to each other, on the other hand, can create repeating light and dark lines on the screen, meaning that the light behaves like a wave.
But in 1905, Albert Einstein realized that light can also act like particles. Later, quantum physicists realized that light is both a particle and a wave, and not something separate. This wave-particle duality applies to all known particles and waves. In fact, both Huygens and Newton were right to some extent.
patterns over time
As part of a new study, scientists from Imperial College London experimented with indium tin oxide, an electrically conductive transparent material. It is used in touch screens of smart phones. When a powerful laser pulse hits a thin layer of this compound, it becomes a mirror for a fraction of a second.
The classic version of the double slit experiment uses two holes in the screens through which light passes, but in the new experiment, the scientists managed to change how much light is reflected. The researchers called these tiny time gaps in the material “time slots.”
To create double-slit interference patterns in time, the physicists’ device would need to change its reflectivity extremely quickly, on timescales comparable to the oscillation rate of light—a few quadrillionths of a second.
“If the entire history of the universe from the Big Bang to the present was one second, it would take only one day for light to be emitted,” says Romain Tyrol of Imperial College London.
Scientists have found that a light beam passing through such time slits is refracted or dispersed into multiple light frequencies or colors. These different frequencies can interfere with each other, creating interference patterns, amplifying or weakening some of them, as with light in the classical double-slit experiment.
The evidence scientists found for this refraction of light was much stronger than they had expected. This indicates that the switching speed of indium tin oxide is 10 to 100 times faster than previously thought, giving much greater control over the light. So scientists say that this material’s interaction with light has new properties that have yet to be discovered and used.
What’s next?
These results show new ways in which scientists are increasingly influencing time. For example, another group of scientists recently demonstrated temporal reflections with light waves, where light signals pass through a “time interface” and behave as if they were traveling back in time.
Time slots and time interfaces could help scientists develop new ways to control light, such as photonic time crystals. While an ordinary crystal is a structure made up of many atoms arranged in a regular pattern in space, time crystals are structures in which many particles are arranged in a regular sequence of motions, that is, forming patterns in time rather than space. In a photonic time crystal, the optical properties change regularly with time.
“Photonic time crystals can be applied to amplify and control light, for example, for computation, and possibly even for quantum computing with light,” Tyrol says.
As already written Focus, scientists have created the world’s smallest “football”. On the world’s smallest “football field”, scientists were able to hurl and catch atoms with the help of light.
Source: Focus
Ashley Fitzgerald is an accomplished journalist in the field of technology. She currently works as a writer at 24 news breaker. With a deep understanding of the latest technology developments, Ashley’s writing provides readers with insightful analysis and unique perspectives on the industry.