When lightsabers collide on the big screen, in video games, and in our imaginations, they flare and catch. In actuality, the beams of light pass through each other, forming spiderweb patterns, much like in a laser light display. Only in fiction—especially in regions with immense magnetic and electric fields, which occurs in nature only near large things like neutron stars—does this clashing, or interference, occur. A strong magnetic or electric field demonstrates that a vacuum isn't entirely void in this situation. Instead, light beams collide here, scattering into rainbows. In current particle accelerators, a modest variant of this phenomenon has been observed, although it is utterly missing from our daily lives or even regular laboratory surroundings.
In
collaboration with Aydin Keser and Oleg Sushkov from the University of New
South Wales in Australia, Yuli Lyanda-Geller, a professor of physics and
astronomy in Purdue University's College of Science, applied quantum field
theory nonperturbative methods used to describe high-energy particles and
expanded them to analyse the behaviour of so-called Dirac materials, which have
recently become the focus of interest. The expansion was utilised to generate
results that go beyond existing high-energy results as well as the broad
framework of condensed matter and materials physics.
They
proposed different experimental configurations with applied electric and
magnetic fields, as well as the ideal materials to examine this quantum
electrodynamic phenomena experimentally in a nonaccelerator scenario. They then
realised that their findings described some magnetic phenomena that had
previously been observed and examined in previous studies better.
Keser,
Lyanda-Geller, and Sushkov showed that this phenomenon can be achieved in a new
class of bismuth-based materials (its solid solutions with antimony and
tantalum arsenide). With this understanding, the effect can be investigated,
potentially leading to far more sensitive sensors and energy storage
supercapacitors that can be turned on and off by a controlled magnetic field.
"Most crucially," Lyanda-Geller stated, "one of the universe's greatest quantum riddles may be verified and analysed in a modest laboratory experiment." "We can examine the influence of the universe using these materials. From our laboratory, we can investigate what happens in neutron stars."
Yuli
Lyanda-Geller is a physicist who specialises in mesoscopic physics and
interference phenomena, optical phenomena in nanostructures, and quantum
information physics. Her article is published in Physical Review Letters and is
available online.
References:
- Aydın Cem Keser et al, Nonlinear Quantum Electrodynamics in Dirac Materials, Physical Review Letters (2022). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.128.066402
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