Researchers suggest that a new form of light could be used in photonic circuits:
New research suggests that it is possible to create a new form of light by binding light to a single electron, combining the properties of both. [...] In normal materials, light interacts with a whole host of electrons present on the surface and within the material. But by using theoretical physics to model the behaviour of light and a recently-discovered class of materials known as topological insulators, Imperial researchers have found that it could interact with just one electron on the surface. This would create a coupling that merges some of the properties of the light and the electron. Normally, light travels in a straight line, but when bound to the electron it would instead follow its path, tracing the surface of the material.
In the study, published today in Nature Communications, Dr Vincenzo Giannini and colleagues modelled this interaction around a nanoparticle – a small sphere below 0.00000001 metres [10 nm] in diameter – made of a topological insulator. Their models showed that as well as the light taking the property of the electron and circulating the particle, the electron would also take on some of the properties of the light.
Normally, as electrons are travelling along materials, such as electrical circuits, they will stop when faced with a defect. However, Dr Giannini's team discovered that even if there were imperfections in the surface of the nanoparticle, the electron would still be able to travel onwards with the aid of the light. If this could be adapted into photonic circuits, they would be more robust and less vulnerable to disruption and physical imperfections.
Single-electron induced surface plasmons on a topological nanoparticle (open, DOI: 10.1038/ncomms12375)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @05:58AM
white light!
red light!?
green light????
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @07:12AM
If we can make robust electronics, how will we ever convince consumers to buy breakable flaky crap?! You fools! Capitalism will collapse!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @10:17AM
See computers... old PC (Pentium 2 generation and before) systems often still work and computer cases were sturdy, but the space race for faster systems, more memory, etc. put them more or less out of business.
Improve your product and people will buy it, even if it is durable.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @06:46PM
"[...] Moore's Law has come to be the most successful marketing gimmick and implementation of planned obsolescence in history."—http://www.itworld.com/article/2949368/hardware/the-impending-end-of-moores-law-is-not-intels-biggest-problem.html [itworld.com]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by anubi on Sunday August 07 2016, @08:32AM
An electron has mass. And if it is entangled to a photon traveling at the speed of light, can we direct this to get thrust?
( Is it possible to make a "flashlight" that develops a thrust when turned on? )
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @09:36AM
Thrust? Didn't you see who discovered this?
They are obviously working on the main armament of the Death Star. Put enough lightspeed electrons in a beam and you have the power to obliterate a planet.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @10:09AM
Is it possible to make a "flashlight" that develops a thrust when turned on?
My fleshlight feels a thrust when I get turned on.
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Sunday August 07 2016, @02:06PM
I read it as "ways to more efficiently control electrons in weird band-gap materials".
So CPU stuff...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 08 2016, @04:24AM
A normal flashlight will work. That's the principle behind solar sails. Light has momentum, even if not mass.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Monday August 08 2016, @12:44PM
I thought solar sails were more for intercepting the stream of ionic wind / charged particles ( which have mass ) streaming from the sun.
However, most of my knowledge of solar wind comes from Jack Vance's short story "Sail 25", read when I was a kid but still remembered.
Noted though the old radiometer - the light bulb with the light powered rotating vanes inside... that thing really fascinated me as a kid.
But they seemed to need *some* air in it to make it work... if it was a hard vacuum, it didn't work. So it did not seem to be the photon impacts forcing the rotation, but the thermal energy coupling to the thin gases in the envelope that caused it to spin.
Little toys like that sure had a big impact on me as a kid. Give 'em one and ask them to explain how it works. If you get a kid with the right mindset, you will send him on endless quests of curiosity over the thing.
( I had a really cool teacher in High school that demonstrated one in a bell jar.... showing us it worked if the bell jar was not completely evacuated. Also showed us how electricity freely left wires, as air was acting like a plastic insulator. Electricity jumped out of the wire at surprisingly low voltages. It was a lesson well shown, as I already knew what I was up against in designing high altitude electronic systems when working in the Aerospace sector - and why neon signs work. I don't think they allow physics to be taught like that anymore. )
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @03:00PM
The Nature article is full of impenetrable terms. I think this is one of those things the experts may understand but they'll never get the average person to understand without dumbing it down so much it missfires. Kind of like the bowling ball on a rubber sheet; hey now you understand General Relativity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 08 2016, @04:28AM
I see the rubber sheet get such a hard time. What's so wrong with that as an analogy, keeping in mind that all abstractions are leaky?
(Score: 2) by stormwyrm on Monday August 08 2016, @06:19AM
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Monday August 08 2016, @06:45AM
Actually by slightly changing direction, it will get accessible to even more people: Instead of going east, start at the equator and go north, Most people will understand that you'll meet at the north pole, and even those who don't will at least believe it.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 07 2016, @03:01PM
Gauss gun? Finally?