Scientists Have Confirmed A Brand New Form Of Matter: Time Crystals

[Fweethawt]

http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-just-announced-a-brand-new-form-of-matter-time-crystals

 

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.

[Jeff]

Perfect timing. I just watched Star Trek last night.

Science is just amazing me lately. Every few days some astounding new thing that sounds impossible

[duderonomy]

I'll wait for BAA's input on this.

[Thurisaz]

^ this.

 

It's another one of those "Amazing if true" topics

[mwc]

     Time crystals sound like sometime that you put in your time machine to make it go.  Or maybe you mix in your drink while you're in your time machine.

 

     Maybe I should take this to a time traveler marketing site?

 

          mwc

[RogueScholar]

This is; unfortunately, a highly complicated discussion filled with nuance. One big issue is concerning the concept of "motion." Most of what I have seen on this topic makes it seem like systems at ground state lack any motion. This is simply not accurate. Even assuming we could cool something to absolute zero, which does not seem possible, there would still be motion.

 

For example, electrons in atoms cooled to near absolute zero in a ground state configuration still have motion as they move around the nucleus of the atom that said electrons are associated with. This is sometimes called zero point energy/motion and is due to a complicated and highly non intuitive quantum mechanical concept known as the Heisenburg uncertainty principle. One thing to remember is this motion just happens and doesn't really need time to define it. It is what we call time independent. In fact, the equation used to describe ground state atoms that are not interacting with other atoms is known as the time independent Schrodinger equation.

 

What appears to be going on here is very different but like the concept of zero point motion, involves quantum mechanics. Subatomic particles have a property known as spin. Unfortunately, there is no way of intuitively describing what spin is. Some may look at it like a spinning planet, but that analogy is incorrect. Spin, in some sense, is a kind of angular momentum. With electrons, they can have of of two spin states. This can either be spin up or spin down.

 

What has been done in this case is to take a collection of Ytterbium ions and place them in a circular configuration using magnetic fields. The Ytterbium ions as I understand have an extra electron (ion = atom that has gained extra electrons or lost electrons) and this extra electron can be put into a specific spin state using lasers. The spin states of the electrons in the ion ring are alternated: up, down, up, down and so on. Then, it was observed that the spin states began to oscillate. Basically, one atom would cause the spin state of an adjacent atom/ion to flip and this cycle would continue ad infinitum.

 

Interestingly, it was observed that the time it took for these spin state changes to occur was longer than expected. This is explained by a violation of time symmetry and that the system was time dependent and exhibiting "motion" that was in a sense, depending only on time.

 

That's the general gist of it and I'm well aware that my reply leads to many more questions. I'm not sure that good answers are available using the limited medium of a message board and the understanding that most of us lack (myself included) the educational framework to dive into complex conversations, but hopefully this reply was helpful on some level.

[rjn]

I got a headache trying to grasp what this means. What does it mean? Oh, don't bother, I'll just get another headache.

[LogicalFallacy]

rjn: Scientists are discovering awesome stuff - that's all ya need to know bud

 

I'm going to stick to evolutionary biology and basic cosmology/astronomy. You start getting into quantum physics and you start thinking you don't really exist.

 

Very interesting though. 

[midniterider]

http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-just-announced-a-brand-new-form-of-matter-time-crystals

 

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.

 

Is someone breaking the laws of physics again!?

[Jeff]

They're more a list of "suggestions"...