A 100-year-old physics problem has been solved

At EPFL, researchers challenge a fundamental law and discover that more electromagnetic energy can be stored in wave-guiding systems than previously thought. The discovery has implications in telecommunications. Working around the fundamental law, they conceived resonant and wave-guiding systems capable of storing energy over a prolonged period while keeping a broad bandwidth. Their trick was to create asymmetric resonant or wave-guiding systems using magnetic fields.

One possible application is in the design of extremely quick and efficient all-optical buffers in telecommunication networks. The role of the buffers is to temporarily store data arriving in the form of light through optical fibers. By slowing the mass of data, it is easier to process. Up to now, the storage quality had been limited.

With this new technique, it should be possible to improve the process and store large bandwidths of data for prolonged times. Other potential applications include on-chip spectroscopy, broadband light harvesting and energy storage, and broadband optical camouflaging ("invisibility cloaking"). "The reported breakthrough is completely fundamental—we're giving researchers a new tool. And the number of applications is limited only by one's imagination," sums up Tsakmakidis

phys.org, June 22, 2017 - A 100-year-old physics problem has been solved.

I know, I know... too technical TEOT! What does it mean?!

The electro-magnetic spectrum is a series of waves at various frequencies. Infrared, microwave, ultra-violet, are just variations as to what frequency you are at. The visible spectrum is part of that.

The researchers at Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne have developed a broad band resonant wave guide. That means that a wide range of frequencies can be stored and/or manipulated. This includes visible light. The "100-year old problem" was when resonant wave guides were created they thought the length of time was limited due wave degradation. As explained in the article...

...these systems were held back by a limitation that was considered to be fundamental: the length of time a wave could be stored was inversely proportional to its bandwidth. This relationship was interpreted to mean that it was impossible to store large amounts of data in resonant or wave-guiding systems over a long period of time because increasing the bandwidth meant decreasing the storage time and quality of storage.

They use a magnetic field to "freeze" the waves in a resonant wave guide. They released the magnetic field and it is as if it was passing through just as normal!

So what?!

Invisibility cloak with no limit of the frequency (i.e., color)! By using a tailored metamaterial that only does a small portion of the spectrum means you are limited (usually weight) by which frequencies you choose to be invisible to. If you have one device that can do multiple frequencies means truly being invisible!

This also means a big bulk up in fiber communications. And like they said, broad spectrum solar harvesting (imagine splitting the beams and then sending them to a specific PV cell tailored to that color) and the big one, energy storage. And those are just the lo hanging fruit.

Welcome to the future!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

The implications for this could revolutionize technology. I am still trying to digest it all, but I think this is BIG

I am thinking that this new technology will be used against the masses in the future. Back in the past, you had to be right in the fighting when they used swords, now, you can be shot by a bullet or drone from someone far away. Now they will make it so we cannot tell the drone or person is around, on top of that, if they mask sound, you will not hear anything either.

I give it twenty years and we will all be slaves worried about our lives. How can you fight something if you can't hear or see it? Look at what is there and isolate what does not appear to be right from reality I suppose.

a reply to: FamCore

I read it and was like... "No way!!"



Explanation on how they did it.

The researchers came up with a hybrid resonant / wave-guiding system made of a magneto-optic material that, when a magnetic field is applied, is able to stop the wave and store it for a prolonged period, thereby accumulating large amounts of energy. Then when the magnetic field is switched off, the trapped pulse is released.

(same source)

GAH!

My search is taking too long...

Since it is always a fun topic here on ATS… some links to other threads

ATS (2016) - Scientists move one step closer to creating an invisibility cloak

- and -

ATS (2011) - Invisibility Cloak: Scientists Achieve Optical Invisibility in Visible Light Range of Spectrum.

ETA: Browser crashed out while posting.

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF
a reply to: FamCore

I read it and was like... "No way!!"

 

Explanation on how they did it.

The researchers came up with a hybrid resonant / wave-guiding system made of a magneto-optic material that, when a magnetic field is applied, is able to stop the wave and store it for a prolonged period, thereby accumulating large amounts of energy. Then when the magnetic field is switched off, the trapped pulse is released.

(same source)

They could make a nice weapon out of that, one that charges itself without need for fueling. What can that technology lead to in the wrong hands.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

The researchers came up with a hybrid resonant / wave-guiding system made of a magneto-optic material that, when a magnetic field is applied, is able to stop the wave and store it for a prolonged period, thereby accumulating large amounts of energy. Then when the magnetic field is switched off, the trapped pulse is released.

Could this be used to shield against an EMP, beyond the use of a Faraday Cage?

a reply to: rickymouse

Did not think "weapon" but, yeah, a super-supercapacitor!!

a reply to: Wreckclues

I'm stuck on "invisibility cloak" and post made by a famous member that at the time did not make any sense to anybody. This "discovery" actually may be the answer which I want to quote exactly from and searching frantically for! LOL

Kind of like an EMP lightening rod?! I like the idea!

How much energy being stored are we talking about here?

Then when the magnetic field is switched off, the trapped pulse is released.

This is what makes me (and likely others) think that this could be used as a weapon.

It would depend on the amount of energy that can be stored before, "the trapped pulse is released."

All explosions are nothing more than the release of trapped energy in an extremely short period of time. The greater the energy and smaller the time frame, the larger the explosion.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Summary of elementary plasma waves


In plasma physics, waves in plasmas are an interconnected set of particles and fields which propagates in a periodically repeating fashion. A plasma is a quasineutral, electrically conductive fluid. In the simplest case, it is composed of electrons and a single species of positive ions, but it may also contain multiple ion species including negative ions as well as neutral particles. Due to its electrical conductivity, a plasma couples to electric and magnetic fields. This complex of particles and fields supports a wide variety of wave phenomena.
Terminology and classification

Waves in plasmas can be classified as electromagnetic or electrostatic according to whether or not there is an oscillating magnetic field. Applying Faraday's law of induction to plane waves, we find k × E ~ = ω B ~ [displaystyle mathbf [k] times [tilde [mathbf [E] ]]=omega [tilde [mathbf [B] ]]] [mathbf [k]]times [tilde [[mathbf [E]]]]=omega [tilde [[mathbf [B]]]], implying that an electrostatic wave must be purely longitudinal. An electromagnetic wave, in contrast, must have a transverse component, but may also be partially longitudinal.

Waves can be further classified by the oscillating species. In most plasmas of interest, the electron temperature is comparable to or larger than the ion temperature. This fact, coupled with the much smaller mass of the electron, implies that the electrons move much faster than the ions. An electron mode depends on the mass of the electrons, but the ions may be assumed to be infinitely massive, i.e. stationary. An ion mode depends on the ion mass, but the electrons are assumed to be massless and to redistribute themselves instantaneously according to the Boltzmann relation. Only rarely, e.g. in the lower hybrid oscillation, will a mode depend on both the electron and the ion mass.

The various modes can also be classified according to whether they propagate in an unmagnetized plasma or parallel, perpendicular, or oblique to the stationary magnetic field. Finally, for perpendicular electromagnetic electron waves, the perturbed electric field can be parallel or perpendicular to the stationary magnetic field.


Source en.wikipedia.org...

some good info i found

Personally I think using resonance of fields will one day offer a breakthrough in the control of gravity. If we can ever actually define gravity.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Every bit of the OP was lost to me because while I have a layman's understanding of the theory, the terminology...

But anyway, YAY!!!

Scientists get excited, I get excited!

a reply to: butcherguy

The article didn't say. But that "only limited by your imagination" seems to mean it can be a huge amount.

Realistically, they have only discovered a method around Lorentz Reciprocity Theorm. But then again it was not just they got around it but went way beyond it. The article says, "1,000 times" beyond.

Since they mentioned lasers, the communication ones are 1-4 mW range (best guestimate. Anyone out there work with telecom and give a better answer?) but that is for that color. As for other applications, "we're gonna need a bigger ship"!! I have no idea how big they can scale or how much energy is needed to make this happen.

Maybe a "cart before the horse" announcement but still pretty d@mn cool!

The first application for any technological break-thru is always weaponization.
Always has been, always will be.
And no doubt the alpha prototypes will be tested on the American public in one form or another.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

So you can survive for centuries in the pattern buffer of the transporter.

Scotty was right!

a reply to: Sysdrone

I wasn't even thinking of plasmas! I wonder if this can be used with fusion plasmas? Confine the gas, create the plasma, freeze it, pulse it like a laser at the deuterium-tritium pellet then create ignition? Hum? Makes my fusion fanboy all kinds of smiley.

Thanks for the info and something more to think about.

a reply to: Nickn3

I am still frantically searching for the post by "He who shall not be named" because I really do think this is what he said in a poetical licensed manner.

"Anti"-gravity will probably be a little more less spectacular than people thought (IMO). Keeping the Higss field from forming or guiding it around you is not really exciting as making "anti-gravity" in the true sense.

a reply to: Jonjonj

I tried to keep my excitement in check while making the OP! Sorry if I did not do an explanation. That is my fault.

Just imagine a Star Trek world. That is where this may take us (pending the answers to Butcherguy' question about amount of energy that is storable)

Sounds important. Im not going to pretend I truly comprehend this. Are they talking about basically using an electromagnetic field to "pause" passing emf frequencies? Or am I way off?

a reply to: flatbush71

Date: July 1, 2014

originally posted by: Astr0

Its tipped nose down at the world and 'walks' the light around it back onto the path it was taking.

This is the quote I was searching for but the "View all post in thread" (source) does not have a pin for the actual page. This is from the great, "Weird California Sighting" thread in the Aircraft Projects forum.

The "it" being tipped nose down in the quote is a BBT (supposedly). At the time, people went, "Huh?" but now you can see with this announcement that it most likely had been figured out for Military purposes. Seems you're spot on with your statement.



a reply to: chr0naut

If he had enough power to run it, then, yeah!

See? A Star Trek future! LOL!



ETA: a reply to: pirhanna

They are using a magnetic field to hold the electromagnetic wave (light) in a container called a "resonant wave guide". It can be stored and released on demand with no degradation to the original wave. When they first made resonant wave guides 100 years ago, they thought they had a limit. Somebody (Lorentz) used Maxwell's equation to set that limit. The announcement is there is not a limit as previously thought.

a reply to: chr0naut

You know what? If you combine the idea of freezing waves with the quantum mechanic world as previously posted at, Quantum Zeno Effect, Counterfactuality, and The Weeping Angels, then we actually may be one step closer to actually creating a "transporter"!

The link describes an experiment where data was transferred one way using quantum effects without the need to entangle two particles first. Sounds kind of the same. Just need a powerful enough computer to stack all your Legos in the right order!

Hell of a way to travel! Spreading a man's molecules all over the universe! --Leonard "Bones" McCoy