Researchers Working On Crystallizing Light

An anonymous reader writes Researchers at Princeton University have begun crystallizing light as part of an effort to answer fundamental questions about the physics of matter. The researchers are not shining light through crystal – they are transforming light into crystal. As part of an effort to develop exotic materials such as room-temperature superconductors, the researchers have locked together photons, the basic element of light, so that they become fixed in place. "It's something that we have never seen before," said Andrew Houck, one of the researchers. "This is a new behavior for light."

Comments

This article makes no sense whatsoever

[MobyDisk]

This article makes no sense. It talks about "crystallizing" light but never says what it means. Then it goes into quantum computers. In the middle, it links to a journals.aps.org article that doesn't even contain the word "crystal" in it. All the quotes are vague things like "It’s something that we have never seen before" which doesn't help either.

I thought the Slashdot comments might help, but they are all just jokes. So I take it no one else understands what this article is about either.

Re:photons are not particles

[u38cg]

Your comment sounded kinda insightful, apart from your use of a made up word 'scenarii'.