It Turns Out Magic Does Exist And Quantum Science Proved It
Something quite remarkable happened in physics and it’s not often you hear scientists talk about magic. In a surprising interaction that Einstein famously called “spooky”, a quantum camera captured images with two-colored light that actually never saw the object.
A traditional camera captures light which bounces back from an object. But in this experiment, photons that never strike the object are the ones that produce its picture. From National Geographic:
“Even other physicists say ‘you can’t do that’ at first, but that is quantum behavior for you, very strange,” says Gabriela Barreto Lemos of the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information in Vienna, Austria, who led the study. A 2009 University of Glasgow experiment with a divided laser beam first demonstrated such “ghost imaging.” But experts say the new technique, which uses two laser beams of different colors, offers new visualization advantages. The two laser beams are “entangled” in quantum physics terms, meaning their photons share characteristics even when far apart. So broadly speaking, altering one alters the other.
“What they’ve done is a very clever trick. In some ways it is magical,” says quantum optics expert Paul Lett of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland, who was not part of the experiment team.
Practical applications could be in medical imaging and silicon chip lithography. For instance, doctors could probe tissues using invisible wavelengths of light that won’t damage cells, while simultaneously using entangled visible light beams to create clear images of the tissues.
If you’d like to read more of the story, check out National Geographic.
