Scientist Investigate A Brand New Form of Matter: Time Crystals (sciencealert.com)

The discovery of "non-equilibrium matter" could re-write the rules of physics. Long-time Slashdot reader jasonbrown quotes ScienceAlert: For months now, there's been speculation that researchers might have finally created time crystals — strange crystals that have an atomic structure that repeats not just in space, but in time, putting them in perpetual motion without energy. Now it's official — researchers have just reported in detail how to make and measure these bizarre crystals. And two independent teams of scientists claim they've actually created time crystals in the lab based off this blueprint, confirming the existence of an entirely new form of matter.
Both teams -- one at Harvard and the other at the University of Maryland -- have submitted their findings to peer-reviewed publications, according to the article, and "the fact that two separate teams have used the same blueprint to make time crystals out of vastly different systems is promising."

Comments

'twice the period'?

[Rick Schumann]

The two lasers that were periodically nudging the ytterbium atoms were producing a repetition in the system at twice the period of the nudges, something that couldn't occur in a normal system.

When they're saying 'twice the period of the nudges', do they mean twice the frequency of the nudges, or twice the duration of the nudges? What I'm after here is, is whether or not they're actually implying that there's more energy coming out of this than is being put into it, and by the way unless I'm totally misreading it, it sounds like this isn't 'perpetual motion' at all, not in the sense I think of 'perpetual motion', because they have to 'nudge' it with a pulse from a laser to cause this effect to occur -- unless what I'm missing here, is that all they have to do is 'nudge' it once, and it starts a self-sustaining oscillation? Even if it's self-sustaining once started, isn't it then in a state of equilibrium regardless, and any attempt to tap into the energy of that oscillation would cause it to stop?

Re:Sounds like bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

Smarter people than you say otherwise:

Time crystals may sound dangerously close to a perpetual motion machine, but it is worth emphasizing one key difference: while time crystals would indeed move periodically in an eternal loop, rotation occurs in the ground state, with no work being carried out nor any usable energy being extracted from the system. Finding time crystals would not amount to a violation of well-established principles of thermodynamics.

Re:Sounds like bullshit

[ClickOnThis]

Smarter people than you say otherwise:

Time crystals may sound dangerously close to a perpetual motion machine, but it is worth emphasizing one key difference: while time crystals would indeed move periodically in an eternal loop, rotation occurs in the ground state, with no work being carried out nor any usable energy being extracted from the system. Finding time crystals would not amount to a violation of well-established principles of thermodynamics.

This. Mod parent up.

Quantum-mechanical systems in their ground state cannot radiate energy, because they are already in their lowest possible energy-state.