Slashdot Mirror
New Form of Matter Melds Lasers, Superconductors
sterlingda writes "Physicists at the University of Pittsburgh have demonstrated a new form of matter that melds the characteristics of lasers and superconductors. The work introduces a new method of moving energy from one point to another as well as a low-energy means of producing a light beam like that from a laser. The new state is a solid filled with a collection of energy particles known as 'polaritons' that have been trapped and slowed using a technique similar to that used to produce a Bose-Einstein condensate. The work is published in the May 18 issue of Science (subscription required to read beyond the abstract)."
Problem being, they have to do these experiments to get us off of the planet in the first place...
Good luck combining fermions with photons. Photons are very much a type of boson, which means they're very much _not_ fermions. Perhaps the biologists should just combine mitochondria and chromosomes too, you know, to simplify the math?
This is really one of the most ignorant posts I've seen.
The community "should spend some time" combining photons, fermions, gluons etc. because "it would probably make much of the math a lot simpler."
Ever heard of string theory? The community has been spending an ENORMOUS amount of time trying to combine this things into a common picture. And trust me - it doesn't make the math simpler. Just ask Ed Witten.
A form of matter with the properties of a laser? Does that mean E=mc2 still holds or is this the form of matter that ghosts are made out, allowing a person's hand to pass through the matter when it's in a low energy state? Or _perhaps_ it was supposed to say something along the lines of "properties of substances that are used to generate lasers"?
the clock on the wall says 4 til 7
Perhaps the OP's sig calling for legalizing pot can shed some light...
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Over the last ten years I've watched the news releases about physics--and it seems that physics is wh0ring itself out just for news headlines.
Perhaps you should actually read the scientific journal articles if you're serious about this, instead of reading the popular reviews which are by definition "dumbed down" such that non-PhD's can understand in layman's terms what is going on.
Did they really demonstrate a new form of matter? What did we have at one time? Solid, liquid, gas, and plasma. We could have mixtures of the forms--like a suspension was a fine mixture of a liquid with a gas.
Did you actually read the JOURNAL article, or are you just extrapolating bullshit based on a popular science review of the actual journal article? If you actually didn't think physicists were 'whoring themselves out' your post would make you look significantly less ignorant.
You quote liquids and gases as being two distinct forms of matter, yet they're actually the same if you look on a phase-diagram plot. So why do you list them as being two separate phases?
Oh wait, that's right, you can go CONTINUOUSLY from liquid to gas, without any phase transition, along a proper thermodynamic trajectory of course! What makes them look like separate states of matter is whether you have a phase transition as you alter the system. And the phase-transition line (in pressure-temperature space) actually ends in a critical point (see here , such that you can choose a proper p-T trajectory either WITH or WITHOUT the phase transition.
Would you call a superconductor a new state of matter? It certainly is quite different from the metallic state, with a well-defined phase transition as you cool below Tc. What about a Bose-Einstein Condensate? What about a phase-transition from superconducting-like nature to BEC? These have all been well studied, and all are acknowledged as states of matter.
The fact that you question whether it's a new state of matter, and you refer merely solid, liquid, gas, and plasma without any reference to phase transitions, really shows your limited understanding of this subject. And that makes it all the more humorous that you actually go on to claim physicists are whoring themselves out.
make world, not war
Sheesh, you're spewing out pseudoscientific mumbo-jumbo like a half-baked Star Trek dialog, and complaining when someone calls you on your BS.
You're telling me that fermions are not subatomic bundles of energy?
Subatomic? Bundle of energy? What the hell are you talking about? The ONLY property that defines whether a 'particle' is a fermion or not is whether it has half-integer spin. And the word 'particle' really refers to is a quantization, which can be any quantized excitation, doesn't mean subatomic.
Then applying the rules of Quantum Electrodynamics, a particle with well-defined half-integer spin must be anti-symmetric upon particle exchange, which leads to things like Fermi-Dirac statistics, the Pauli exclusion principle which is what makes atomic states look the way they are, etc.
make world, not war
Maybe quantum mechanics invites bipolar trolls. If someone claims a wave, they can argue a particle. If someone claims a particle, they can argue a wave. If some claims duality then they can argue ambiguity.
You're totally confusing spin with particle/wave duality, which makes one really wonder what the hell you are talking about. You may be impressing the moderators with your blatantly-incorrect usage of fancy techie-sounding words, but it's quite obvious to the physicists here that you have no clue what you're talking about. And the irony is that you're guilty of that 'whoring out' which you are accusing actual physicists of.
Your original quote misconstrued the nature of fermionic vs bosonic natures of quanta, which the GP clarified, and you resorted to a wikipedia quote, which is quite out of context.
Irrespective of particle-wave nature, photons are spin-1 bosons! Why the hell are you bringing particle/wave duality into the picture at all?
All I suggested is that, rather than pronouncing new unprecedented discoveries every month, maybe the physicists ought to look into solidifying their dual wave-particle of photons. They'll find that all these other "new particles" and "new forms of matter" fit neatly with a which has been established for at least fifteen years.
If you had an inkling of the physics research, including theoretical, simulational, and experimental, that goes on in "highly-correlated" condensed-matter systems, you'd understand that the framework for identifying the various quanta and behaviors are well-defined within the basic "standard model" for realizable laboratory conditions. And this has been well-understood for longer than 15 years, what exactly is this 15-year time frame you're quoting anyway?
What is interesting is how modern 'exotic' materials can exhibit quanta with different charge, spin, phonon, etc properties than 'plain vanilla' systems. See spin-charge separation in a Luttinger Liquid for an older example. Armchair scientists like you may prefer to use the recent buzzword of emergent behavior if you like, although I don't agree Laughlin's mindview on the whole field of emergence.
make world, not war
"Once past the range of a whole atom then everything truly is just a particle, with a waveform, which carries energy."
Out of curiosity, when you say things like that do you actually expect to be taken seriously by scientists here?
make world, not war
Tell you what, you tell me the query to type in and I'll do it.
Ya sarcastic bastard.
Godless heathen.
A 'state of matter' is typically regarded as having different macroscopic properties brought about by a phase transition. Of course ice/water is a great example, but superconductor/metal in aluminum is another example as well. If you really don't agree with this, then you'd consider gas and plasma to be the same state of matter (a point that the original poster disagrees since (s)he specifically mentioned gas/plasma being distinct states).
However, regarding the 'state' itself, it refers to the collective excitations being considered. Ie, one has an an electron 'gas' inside a 'solid' block of copper. The copper atoms (minus the conduction electrons) act as a solid regarding phonon behavior (and why that block of copper moves like a solid when you tap it but doesn't flow like liquid). Meanwhile the free conduction electrons inside that block act as a Fermi gas (more accurately as a Fermi liquid if you want to properly account for interactions).
Human physiology makes us more aware of the phonic nature of stuff, like whether it's a solid (has long-range interactions), liquid (short-range interactions), or gas (weakly interacting). But there ARE distinctive states due to electronic charge interactions (superconductor/metal/insulator) or magnetic interactions (ferromagnet/anti-ferrogmagnet), etc.
If you really want to break it down, the point you're trying to argue is that "state of matter" should refer ONLY to the phononic behavior, and entirely ignore electronic and magnetic behaviors. At this point the debate becomes only a useless argument over philosophical and linguistic minutae.
make world, not war