Related topics: light · laser · electrons · molecules · atoms

Gold in limbo between solid and melted states

If you heat a solid material enough, the thermal energy (latent heat) causes the material's molecules begin to break apart, forming a liquid. One of the most familiar examples of this phase transition from a well-ordered ...

Cooling with light

ETH researchers have cooled a nanoparticle to a record low temperature, thanks to a sophisticated experimental set-up that uses scattered laser light for cooling. Until now, no one has ever cooled a nanoparticle to such ...

A tiny switch for a few particles of light

The Jedi knights of the Star Wars saga are engaged in an impossible fight. This does not result from the superiority of the enemy empire, but from physics because laser swords cannot be used for fighting like metallic blades: ...

New antimatter gravity experiments begin at CERN

We learn it at high school: Release two objects of different masses in the absence of friction forces and they fall down at the same rate in Earth's gravity. What we haven't learned, because it hasn't been directly measured ...

Detecting the birth and death of a phonon

Phonons are discrete units of vibrational energy predicted by quantum mechanics that correspond to collective oscillations of atoms inside a molecule or a crystal. When such vibrations are produced by light interacting with ...

Laser loop couples quantum systems over a distance

For the first time, researchers have succeeded in creating strong coupling between quantum systems over a great distance. They accomplished this with a novel method in which a laser loop connects the systems, enabling nearly ...

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