Montréal (Quebec) - Often times when professors submit research grant proposals, they include very lofty stated goals. And while the real world is the real world and it's not always possible to achieve those goals in practicality, science is usually advanced in mostly measurable and predictable ways. Well, that is exactly what didn't happen at Canada's McGill University when they accidentally discovered a new state of matter, now dubbed "quasi-3D".
Quasi 3D
The team's achievement came in what seems like the most bizarre set of circumstances. While operating at temperatures 100 times colder than intergalactic space, using the world's most powerful reusable magnetic field (at the Magnet Lab in Tallahassee, Florida), a super-enhanced version of what was first predicted in a 1934 theory by Hungarian physicist Eugene Wigner, was observed.
Wigner predicted something called a "two dimensional electron crystal." While the 2D version was not observed in the lab until the 1990s, what's now been seen is a new Quasi 3D version of the basically same thing. Results of their findings are published in the October issue of Nature Physics.
First observed in 2005
Dr. Guillaume Gervais, McGill's Ultra-Low Temperature Condensed Matter Experiment Lab director, first observed the phenomena by accident in a 2005 ultra-low temperature experiment. His team has spent considerable time and effort since then to reproduce the phenomena. His team only had access to the Magnet Lab in Florida for five days this year. It was on day three their discovery was made.
He describes an electron crystal like this: "Picture a sandwich, and the ham in the middle is your electrons. In a 2D electron crystal, the electrons are squeezed between two materials and they're two dimensional. They can move on a plane, like billiard balls on a pool table, but there's no up and down motion. There's a thickness, but they're stuck.
"We decided to tweak the two-dimensionality by applying a very large magnetic field, using the largest magnet in the world." What followed was Gervais and his team taking the 2D crystal at temperatures near absolute zero with a nearly 100 Tesla magnetic field (roughly 2 million times more powerful than a typical refrigerator magnet), to reliably reproduce the new state of matter.
The result is "actually not quite 3-D, it's an in-between state, a totally new phenomenon," said Gervais. It's also one they're not entirely sure what to do with because it wasn't predicted before it was observed.
Scratching their heads
Existing physics theories and models do not account for this state of matter. Dr. Gervais said, "This is the kind of thing the theoreticians love. Now they're scratching their heads and trying to fine-tune their models." But many questions now exist relating to this new quantum state of matter, like "if this is there and we didn't even know about it, then what else is wrong with our theories?"
Pure semiconductor
The team conducted their research using one of the purest forms of semiconductor material ever created by man. And while essentially the same exact material used in modern semiconductor products like CPUs and flash memory, the 3D electron crystal was made possible by this material and presents real challenges in identifying and addressing the full scope of observed quantum effects. For example, our science will reach super-small feature sizes by the end of the next decade which will, using current theories and understandings, be solid walls for further semiconductor advancement.
This discovery also carries with it the potential of directing future scientific efforts. Consider that while Gervais says the problem is partly academic, it may be possible if, for example, this new quasi-3D electron crystal can be studied in greater detail, to answer many other existing questions. And many new questions may be uncovered which help guide future thought on quantum states of matter.
How do we overcome the foreseen quantum barriers and limitations? Possibly by finding solutions to the previously unseen. And more importantly to consumers, will any of this research help scientists develop products to allow Moore's Law's continuance beyond the end of the next decade?
If continued research is possible, or if the theories can be worked out which account for this newly observed state of matter, then it may very well be that such a discovery directly affects the future of the entire semiconductor industry. And that is exactly the scope and potential of finding something like a totally new, unexpected and unexplained state of matter.
Summary
It's these accidental discoveries which literally drive our science. And with man's machines becoming more and more powerful every month, the rate at which similar discoveries will fly in the face of traditional reason should only escalate.
It would not surprise me at all if science solves the Theory of Everything in my lifetime. The merging of all known forms of matter, energy, force and time into a single theory which ... well, explains everything, but also allows for basically anything to be constructed because everything about everything is understood by application of the theory.
Sound confusing? Try looking through some of the theories which attempt to do this. Or, even simpler, try looking at Einstein's 43-pages of hand-written field equations on Relativity from the early 1900s. He developed all of them without the aid of any computer. The man wasn't human. And our modern science is also becoming quite inhuman in my opinion. It's unattainable, cold, distant, difficult to understand outside of broad strokes. To quote C. J. Cregg from The West Wing, "You got to be a cryptographer. [Scientists] speak in combinations of letters that don't spell anything, but end up meaning table salt." Truer words were rarely spoken.
Quasi 3D
The team's achievement came in what seems like the most bizarre set of circumstances. While operating at temperatures 100 times colder than intergalactic space, using the world's most powerful reusable magnetic field (at the Magnet Lab in Tallahassee, Florida), a super-enhanced version of what was first predicted in a 1934 theory by Hungarian physicist Eugene Wigner, was observed.
Wigner predicted something called a "two dimensional electron crystal." While the 2D version was not observed in the lab until the 1990s, what's now been seen is a new Quasi 3D version of the basically same thing. Results of their findings are published in the October issue of Nature Physics.
First observed in 2005
Dr. Guillaume Gervais, McGill's Ultra-Low Temperature Condensed Matter Experiment Lab director, first observed the phenomena by accident in a 2005 ultra-low temperature experiment. His team has spent considerable time and effort since then to reproduce the phenomena. His team only had access to the Magnet Lab in Florida for five days this year. It was on day three their discovery was made.
He describes an electron crystal like this: "Picture a sandwich, and the ham in the middle is your electrons. In a 2D electron crystal, the electrons are squeezed between two materials and they're two dimensional. They can move on a plane, like billiard balls on a pool table, but there's no up and down motion. There's a thickness, but they're stuck.
"We decided to tweak the two-dimensionality by applying a very large magnetic field, using the largest magnet in the world." What followed was Gervais and his team taking the 2D crystal at temperatures near absolute zero with a nearly 100 Tesla magnetic field (roughly 2 million times more powerful than a typical refrigerator magnet), to reliably reproduce the new state of matter.
The result is "actually not quite 3-D, it's an in-between state, a totally new phenomenon," said Gervais. It's also one they're not entirely sure what to do with because it wasn't predicted before it was observed.
Scratching their heads
Existing physics theories and models do not account for this state of matter. Dr. Gervais said, "This is the kind of thing the theoreticians love. Now they're scratching their heads and trying to fine-tune their models." But many questions now exist relating to this new quantum state of matter, like "if this is there and we didn't even know about it, then what else is wrong with our theories?"
Pure semiconductor
The team conducted their research using one of the purest forms of semiconductor material ever created by man. And while essentially the same exact material used in modern semiconductor products like CPUs and flash memory, the 3D electron crystal was made possible by this material and presents real challenges in identifying and addressing the full scope of observed quantum effects. For example, our science will reach super-small feature sizes by the end of the next decade which will, using current theories and understandings, be solid walls for further semiconductor advancement.
This discovery also carries with it the potential of directing future scientific efforts. Consider that while Gervais says the problem is partly academic, it may be possible if, for example, this new quasi-3D electron crystal can be studied in greater detail, to answer many other existing questions. And many new questions may be uncovered which help guide future thought on quantum states of matter.
How do we overcome the foreseen quantum barriers and limitations? Possibly by finding solutions to the previously unseen. And more importantly to consumers, will any of this research help scientists develop products to allow Moore's Law's continuance beyond the end of the next decade?
If continued research is possible, or if the theories can be worked out which account for this newly observed state of matter, then it may very well be that such a discovery directly affects the future of the entire semiconductor industry. And that is exactly the scope and potential of finding something like a totally new, unexpected and unexplained state of matter.
Summary
It's these accidental discoveries which literally drive our science. And with man's machines becoming more and more powerful every month, the rate at which similar discoveries will fly in the face of traditional reason should only escalate.
It would not surprise me at all if science solves the Theory of Everything in my lifetime. The merging of all known forms of matter, energy, force and time into a single theory which ... well, explains everything, but also allows for basically anything to be constructed because everything about everything is understood by application of the theory.
Sound confusing? Try looking through some of the theories which attempt to do this. Or, even simpler, try looking at Einstein's 43-pages of hand-written field equations on Relativity from the early 1900s. He developed all of them without the aid of any computer. The man wasn't human. And our modern science is also becoming quite inhuman in my opinion. It's unattainable, cold, distant, difficult to understand outside of broad strokes. To quote C. J. Cregg from The West Wing, "You got to be a cryptographer. [Scientists] speak in combinations of letters that don't spell anything, but end up meaning table salt." Truer words were rarely spoken.