Nobel-Prize-Winning Physicist To Test Perpetual Motion in "Time Crystals"

Theoretical Physicist Frank Wilzcek plans to set up an experiment to test a theory of perpetual motion in time crystals, that might lead to a better understanding of space and time in quantum theory.

Source: Perpetual Motion Test Could Amend Theory of Time

In February 2012, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Frank Wilczek decided to go public with a strange and, he worried, somewhat embarrassing idea. Impossible as it seemed, Wilczek had developed an apparent proof of “time crystals” — physical structures that move in a repeating pattern, like minute hands rounding clocks, without expending energy or ever winding down. Unlike clocks or any other known objects, time crystals derive their movement not from stored energy but from a break in the symmetry of time, enabling a special form of perpetual motion.

Illustration of the planned experiment:

Fig.: Electric fields will be used to corral calcium ions into a 100-micron-wide “trap,” where they will form a crystalline ring. The scientists believe a static magnetic field will cause the ring to rotate. (Illustration: Courtesy of Hartmut Häffner)


The planned experiment ("big test") ist based on an earlier theoretical study from 2012 (details here and here) The following excerpt from the article explains the underlying theory on time crystals a bit more in detail:

When matter crystallizes, its atoms spontaneously organize themselves into the rows, columns and stacks of a three-dimensional lattice. An atom occupies each “lattice point,” but the balance of forces between the atoms prevents them from inhabiting the space between. Because the atoms suddenly have a discrete, rather than continuous, set of choices for where to exist, crystals are said to break the spatial symmetry of nature — the usual rule that all places in space are equivalent (...)

Eventually, his equations indicated that atoms could indeed form a regularly repeating lattice in time, returning to their initial arrangement only after discrete (rather than continuous) intervals, thereby breaking time symmetry. Without consuming or producing energy, time crystals would be stable, in what physicists call their “ground state” (...)

DISCLAIMER:
I'm not so much into physics as to theorize about any implications or practical use concerning the results, but I thought I'd post this here for further discussion (and speculation) ...

reply to post by jeep3r

Time crystals. To take the concept out to one or more of its limits, I suppose if we say that time itself can form a crystal and "duplicate itself/grow itself" then all of time could be crystalized (is this the dark matter???) and that's what creates/created space. Could the Big Bang have been (and still is) a very fast spontaneous crystal growth?

Thanks for the detailed post, and this could be a very good thread if lots of data is added.

I wonder if it's a degenerate system.
And interesting to see if it can a ground state at temperatures above zero.

reply to post by Aleister

Thanks, Aleister!

I can't really comment on how that might relate to "dark matter" ... but it may be worth quoting what Wilczek himself says about potential applications resulting from his theory:

"Wilczek also suggested that a computing device could be possible with different rotational states representing information, and maybe different kinds of ions. Since this construct is in the lowest energy state it could in principle survive the heat death of the universe and continue forever."

Source: Wikipedia

Just wanted to post the above excerpt, so that we actually have something more concrete in our minds when it comes to potential real-world results of this theory ...

I did some searching on the web to get a better idea of what a space-time crystal actually is, because I had difficulties grasping the concept myself:

"To visualize a time crystal, think of Earth looping back to its same location in space every 365¼ days; the planet repeats itself periodically as it moves through time. But a true time crystal is made not of a planet but of an object in its lowest energy state, like an electron stripped of all possible energy. This object could endlessly loop in time, just as electrons in a superconductor could theoretically flow through space for all eternity."

Figure (a) shows a possible structure of a space-time crystal. It has periodic structures in both space and time. The particles rotate in one direction, even at the lowest energy state. Figure (b) shows ultracold ions caught in a ring-shaped trapping potential in a weak magnetic field.

(Source)

And here's yet another way of looking at space-time crystals ...

Imagine a clock that will keep perfect time forever, even after the heat-death of the universe. This is the “wow” factor behind a device known as a “space-time crystal,” a four-dimensional crystal that has periodic structure in time as well as space. However, there are also practical and important scientific reasons for constructing a space-time crystal.

(Source)

And here goes the explanation that I personally found the most helpful:

Crystals by definition have a certain structure that is repeated over and over again through space, like so. The idea behind the 4D clock is that, since space and time are intimately related, it should be possible to create a crystal that repeats itself over and over through time as well. This has been proven to work mathematically, and these researchers have a plan to actually build one, although they aren't able to with current technology.

The way it actually works is a little hard to explain but I'll try my best. The first thing you need is an ion trap, which is a fancy way of saying "holding something in place with electric and magnetic fields." This video is a good demonstration of one. The second thing you need to understand are ground states, which are fancy way of saying "the lowest amount of energy a particle can have." A particle in a ground state is very stable because unless something gives it more energy, it's happy to stay that way forever.

The 4D clock uses a combination of the two ideas. The key point is that, if you put a ground state particle into the ion trap, it will start rotating on its own. Since rotation is something that repeats the same thing over and over (like how the Earth returns to the same position at the start of every day), you now have a particle that repeats itself through time the same way a 3D crystal repeats through space. Combine a regular 3D crystal with the ion trap idea, and you now have a 4D crystal.

(Source)

Hope this helps ...

reply to post by jeep3r

I gave you a flag for messing with my mind

reply to post by VoidHawk

Thanks for that flag!

And I assure you: you're not the only one whose mind had been messed with as a result of this announcement. I'm somewhat lacking the physics background on that level but I couldn't resist posting about space-time crystals and perpetual motion ... what a strange combination of terms?!?!

Yet, I now have at least a very rough idea of what they're up to and I look forward to (perhaps) understanding how this could translate into practical applications ... someday ... provided their experiment will be a success!

Eventually, his equations indicated that atoms could indeed form a regularly repeating lattice in time, returning to their initial arrangement only after discrete (rather than continuous) intervals, thereby breaking time symmetry.

Without consuming or producing energy, time crystals would be stable, in what physicists call their “ground state” (...)

Just a quick update concerning a potential visualization:

If I understood the above quote right, the atoms (in the ion trap) would be forced to move in a discrete manner along the lattice or grid, rather than moving continuously as we are used to from natural motion.

So if we could somehow 'observe' this movement, it should look a bit like in this animated gif, I suppose? If this were correct, then each discrete rotation phase would then represent an advance in time (like eg. one nano-second later) and the time-crystal would realign in the next available space on the grid.


So I assume we would observe a choppy kind of movement, which IMHO would be a rather strange and unusual sight.

I don't know if this would be a legit representation (!?) of what we could observe during the experiment, but it's how I understand it at this point. Please let me know in case you have any thoughts on this or in case you don't think this is an appropriate way of illustrating the anticipated effect ...

That's how I understood it too..

Put simply, a crystal is like splitting space up into a number of boxes in which a particle can exist, rather than a continuous space. Visualizing the same for time is as easy as thinking about how the second hand on most clocks work.. it doesnt slide continuously, it ticks from one space to the next instantly. (well, technically it doesnt just appear at the next second location, but you get the idea)

reply to post by jeep3r


I'm wondering if the sleestaks got their mitts on these first...

We have hardware like that - it's called a stepper motor. A traditional DC electric motor has continuous rotation - the axle can move at a range of RPM speeds depending on fuel or electric input. A stepper motor doesn't rotate continuously but moves through a fixed number of positions. The axle always rotates a fixed angle whenever activated.

en.wikipedia.org...

So these crystals implement this at an atomic level. The one ion trapped in the cage can only move to discrete positions.

So what your trying to tell me is I am Fat!

OK, let me drop off the deep end here for a moment, and forgive me for the generalizations and simplifications, I'm trying to find the language for the concepts here...

If time can be said to become crystallized, than it follows that you can build things from a lattice of time crystals, like a LEGO set. To what purpose, I have no idea.

If I'm reading this theory correctly, "time" becomes meaningless to whatever thing is trapped in the crystal, "duration" is seen over and over and over.

If space and time are set up the same way, could you in effect have a table of temperal elements? I don't think the language exists for what I'm thinking about. Space, matter has a structure we can see and define. Atoms, molecules, elements, etc. What if there is an analogue, but for time? I may be thinking about this all wrong, and forgive me if that is the case. Heady days of discovery await if this is true!

First things first, WTF!?!?! My brain just exploded trying to grab ahold of this.

I have a minimal knowledge of physics and of mathematical physics or whatever the heck this qualifies as. But if I can picture it correctly...a time crystal is sort of like a spiral staircase, but that the staircase doesn't necessarily go 'up,' when you 'turn the engine on' the staircase starts to grow in space in and time, which I guess could mean that it will create a cylinder structure or possible just continuously spin on a flat plane. One could theoretically harness the energy created by this, I don't know how though. I'm trying to grasp the words for the thought...

This seems like the first feasible energy source that I've seen that makes sense for UFO propulsion. Turning off the engine and stopping the creation of new crystalline structure wouldn't mean that energy had stopped flowing, which would enable a craft to appear to hover, and then dart off when the engine was restarted.

I dunno, the possibilities of this are endless. Or at least the implications. Space travel. Time travel. Inter-dimensional travel. Or just any information on those three topics that don't involve travel.

Fascinating topic. This is also one of those things were science just seems to be trying to create an experiment that somehow destroys us all. I also finally got the Land of the Lost sleestak reference, because they actually do have inter-dimensional/time/space/doom-us-all crystals.

Lol, The way you describe it here sounds a bit like Groundhog Day (The Movie). Great classic btw. Great thread very interesting. S&F

Originally posted by Vonotar
OK, let me drop off the deep end here for a moment, and forgive me for the generalizations and simplifications, I'm trying to find the language for the concepts here...

If time can be said to become crystallized, than it follows that you can build things from a lattice of time crystals, like a LEGO set. To what purpose, I have no idea.

If I'm reading this theory correctly, "time" becomes meaningless to whatever thing is trapped in the crystal, "duration" is seen over and over and over.

If space and time are set up the same way, could you in effect have a table of temperal elements? I don't think the language exists for what I'm thinking about. Space, matter has a structure we can see and define. Atoms, molecules, elements, etc. What if there is an analogue, but for time? I may be thinking about this all wrong, and forgive me if that is the case. Heady days of discovery await if this is true!

Let me see if I can do better. Crystals are atoms in their ground state in a repeating pattern. They have no energy to lose. In matter, they are organized in a repeating lattice. They don't really move.

Piezoelectricity happens when certain crystals are squeezed and they give off a static charge.

I think what the article is saying is that there are symmetrical patterns that can occur in ground state atoms along a time axis. Can such a structure be stressed to the point where energy can be obtained from the non-energetic processes repeating indefinitely within?

So in like 60 yearswe can go to a museum and see the world's longest running perpetual time crystal electron? If they ate supposed to go forever, we should start one and just let it keep going...you know, to commemorate the discovery! We don't really need a reason. It's just like the impulse you have to push one plus one, or two times two on a calculator, and then keep pushing the equals button as many t imes as you can until you need to go do something else or when the screen shows ERROR. Or how odometer milestones mean something to us. Except this is way more awesome.

We need to have a counter with an LCD display. Black with a grey etch a sketch colored background. And then, humanity will just use that as a clock and create new units of time that will be meaningful even as we treck across the universe into new worlds... It will be like "Star Date 142.58 in the Daggobah system. Oh yes, you know there will be a Daggoba system... Someone someday will discover a sun with a swamp world of yodas and call it the Dagoba system. I gave myself three tries, did I spell it right? I'm kinda leaning toward my final spelling.

So in like 60 yearswe can go to a museum and see the world's longest running perpetual time crystal electron? If they ate supposed to go forever, we should start one and just let it keep going...you know, to commemorate the discovery! We don't really need a reason. It's just like the impulse you have to push one plus one, or two times two on a calculator, and then keep pushing the equals button as many t imes as you can until you need to go do something else or when the screen shows ERROR. Or how odometer milestones mean something to us. Except this is way more awesome.

We need to have a counter with an LCD display. Black with a grey etch a sketch colored background. And then, humanity will just use that as a clock and create new units of time that will be meaningful even as we treck across the universe into new worlds... It will be like "Star Date 142.58 in the Daggobah system. Oh yes, you know there will be a Daggoba system... Someone someday will discover a sun with a swamp world of yodas and call it the Dagoba system. I gave myself three tries, did I spell it right? I'm kinda leaning toward my final spelling.

reply to post by 3n19m470

Well, I do hope they stop rotating/replicating when you deactivate the ion-trap!

As for potential risks, I would suppose some of the scientists involved in this experiment will have considered undesired consequences and dangers ... !?

ok, everyone who reads this thread, also read the thread about the "torus" "rodin"

i literally had like 5 epiphany s in a row...

www.abovetopsecret.com...