Harvard University and MIT collaborative research team succeeded in bringing photons together like a lightsaber

ByAntonio Roberts

It is thought that photons (photons) are elementary particles that do not collide with (interfere with) each other as the light travels independently without crossing two lights even if two lights cross each other . However, Harvard University and MIT's collaborative research team succeeded in interfering photons with each other and uniting them, and reversed the established theory on photons so far.

Scientists create never-before-seen form of matter
http://phys.org/news/2013-09-scientists-never-before-seen.html

Scientists create 'light saber' material with photon-binding technique | The Verge
http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/26/4773354/scientists-create-light-saber-material-with-photon-binding-technique

Entanglement between light and an optical atomic excitation: Nature: Nature Publishing Group
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v498/n7455/abs/nature12227.html?lang=en

A joint research team at Harvard · MIT cryogenic center puts rubidium atoms in a vacuum chamber,absolute temperatureAfter cooling to nearby, this rubidiumElectron cloudUsing a laser pulse to a singlePhoton (photon)Was irradiated.

When a photon enters the electron cloud, it passes the energy to the atom, so the speed decreases when it leaves the electron cloud, but the photon that passed through the medium maintains the identity when entering and leaving the medium.

However, Professor Mikhail Lukin at Harvard University and Professor Bradin Wrelett and Research Team at MIT found that two different photons, which were separately placed in the rubidium electron cloud, interfere with each other, so as to be one photon We discovered that it will come out of the electronic cloud in a coupled state.

ByNASA Goddard Space Flight Center

So far we have tied up photons with atomic assemblies in a high specific energy state of energy in the Rydberg excited stateQuantum entanglementIn the state of storing and releasing photonsOther research team succeededAt this time, it is thought that due to the effect called "rudeberg excitation blockade", only one excited state occurs in the aggregate at a time, and atoms near excited state atoms are not excited It was.

If two clouds are irradiated on the electron cloud and the first photon excites atoms, if the atoms are excited by the second photon, usually the first photon is removed from the electron cloud You should. In this experiment, however, two different photons push each other and attract each other and transmit energy together to the excited state, and then released from the electron cloud in a coupled state. It means that the photon behaved like two atoms, and when leaving the medium it means that it coalesced like a single photon. In other words,Photons which were thought not to influence each other mutually interfereIt shows that.

Although the behavior of such photons has been theoretically considered and discussed in the past, it is the first time actually observed. Dr. Lukin said: "When photons mutually interfere, they push each other. The movement of these elementary particles is due to the fact that light is gatheredLightsaberIt is not necessarily similar to 'I am joking,' the new discovery about this photon is not a lightsaberQuantum computerI hope it will be applied.

ByViolinha

Light is a decisive factor for the mechanism of quantum computers where light is both particles and a wave (Duality of particles and wavesTherefore, physicists have been struggling with the research of photons, because they have propagation properties and do not stay in a certain space. However, Dr. Lukin believes that the existence of a medium that can interfere with the photons discovered in this experiment may further advance research on photons themselves and quantum theory.