From New Scientist
Ordinary crystals are three-dimensional objects whose atoms are arranged in regular, repeating patterns – just like table salt. They adopt this structure because it uses the lowest amount of energy possible to maintain.
Earlier this year, Frank Wilczek, a theoretical physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, speculated that a similar structure might repeat regularly in the fourth dimension – time.
Wilczek has also theorised that a working time crystal could be made into a computer, with different rotational states standing in for the 0s and 1s of a conventional computer.
The article includes a description (by Tongcang Li from the University of California, and others) of how such a time crystal could be built. Though it will be tricky because building the crystal will need temperatures close to absolute zero.
While Wilczek points out that the heat-death of the universe is, in principle, "very user friendly" for this kind of experiment because it would be cold and dark, there are other issues to consider.
(Score: 2) by cosurgi on Monday July 06 2015, @09:04PM
Thanks!
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#\ @ ? [adom.de] Colonize Mars [kozicki.pl]
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @09:53PM
No problem. Also that's definitely a Dirac delta in the potential. I only skimmed it but from what he said about phidot, I'd suspect that phi is "multivalued" in the sense that it has multiple branches. But as I say I'd have to read it and quantum mechanics (or field theory, come to that) is very far from my field.
(Score: 2) by boristhespider on Monday July 06 2015, @09:54PM
Sorry, that was me. Posted via my work machine which I don't use logins (other than email) on.