Matter and Light Unite!

[Tenet Nosce]

Controlling Quantum Tunneling With Light: Novel Particle Opens Door to Taming Mysteries of Tunneling

ScienceDaily (Apr. 5, 2012) — Scientists at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge have used light to help push electrons through a classically impenetrable barrier. While quantum tunnelling is at the heart of the peculiar wave nature of particles, this is the first time that it has been controlled by light.

According to team leader, Professor Jeremy Baumberg, "the trick to telling electrons how to pass through walls, is to now marry them with light."

Research scientist Peter Cristofolini added: "The offspring of this marriage are actually new indivisible particles, made of both light and matter, which disappear through the slab-like walls of semiconductor at will."

Being in two places at once, these new electronic particles hold the promise of transferring ideas from atomic physics into practical devices, using quantum mechanics visible to the eye.

[Patrick]

Cool, they are now closer to finally figuring out that matter is made of light.