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Another New State of Matter

Posted by michael on from the paler-shade-of-midnight dept.

llamalicious writes: "And you thought a Nobel Prize for the discovery of Bose-Einstein Condensates was nifty, SciAm's reporting that scientists are taking this new discovery one step further, and have once more proven that we don't really know anything about quantum physics. This new state is being called a patterned fluid, which could supposedly move the field of quantum computing ahead."

3 of 13 comments (clear)

  1. That really cool by TheGonzoKid · · Score: 3, Interesting
    That's really cool just a few billionths of a degree above zero. I was always fascinated by quantum effects on super cooled liquids. Like that one experiment where water climbs out of the glass. I forget who it was that said, "If you think you understand Quantum Physics you don't"

    --
    "when the going get's wierd the wierd turn pro." -hst
  2. Re:Am I missing the point? by dabacon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The real accomplishment was using a Bose-Einstein condesate to very easily construct and arrangement of atoms that would otherwise be technologically very hard

    Yep. While, as mentioned, you could do this with any supercold gas, the important point is that one should be able to use this to create uniformly populated optical lattices. This would be great for doing things like [hype mode on]building a quantum computer![hype mode off]

    Also neat is that this looks like a nice clean system for studying a quantum phase transition, but calling it a new state of matter is a bit odd. As far as I know, the observation of a Mott Insulator is nothing new...though in the context of supercold atomic systems this is probably new.

    Interestingly, when I searched Google for Mott Insulator, this experiment was the first to come up! Wow.

    Dabacon

  3. Re:Am I missing the point? by Analog+Squirrel · · Score: 3, Interesting
    If I understand the Nature summary correctly, the patterned fluid is analagous to a Mott insulator... I think what is considered to be new is the state that produces this effect - the article is careful to state that it is not a heat related phenomena, but one driven by the Heisenberg principle - that is the optical system doesn't heat the fluid up to produce a standing wave - the wave is a result of a more fundamental principle....

    Of course, it has been a long time since I slept through quantum mechanics, so I've probably missed just as much, if not more than you.... :-)

    --
    I'd rather be flying