Time crystals: A new state of matter that outlasts the universe

[rangerrebew]

Feature

3 May 2017
Time crystals: A new state of matter that outlasts the universe

A bizarre oscillating material that seems to run on a never-ending loop has apparently been made in the lab, bending the cast-iron laws of thermodynamics
 

By Shannon Palus

IT’S LIKE something out of a bad dream. You’re stuck in a dance hall performing an interminable waltz. The hours go by and the dance continues. The hours melt into days, years, centuries, millennia. Eventually, billions of years have passed in which the universe has transformed into a featureless void populated only by you and your fellow indefatigable waltzers, dancing throughout eternity.

The vision is surreal, nightmarish – and entirely against the laws of physics. Anything that repeats on loop without an external energy source to power it seems to bend the cast-iron laws of thermodynamics, which govern how energy flows and can be exploited. So when five years ago, Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek speculated about a type of material that he called time crystals whose components could, in fact, do just that, he faced a wave of scepticism. “I took a lot of grief,” he says.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23431240-200-time-crystals-the-loopy-gizmos-that-repeat-their-tricks-forever/

[rangerrebew]

A bizarre oscillating material that seems to run on a never-ending loop has apparently been made in the lab, bending the cast-iron laws of thermodynamics
 

However, the "laws" of global warming are accepted without question.

[Smokin Joe]

For now we see as through a glass darkly...

We don't even understand the fundamental forces of gravity and time yet.

[Polly Ticks]

Huh.  I think I read about that once or twice.

[thackney]

Discrete Time Crystals: Rigidity, Criticality, and Realizations
https://physics.aps.org/featured-article-pdf/10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.030401
N. Y. Yao,1 A. C. Potter,1,2 I.-D. Potirniche,1 and A. Vishwanath1,3

1: Department of Physics, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
2: Department of Physics, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, USA
3: Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA
(Received 5 November 2016; published 18 January 2017)

Despite being forbidden in equilibrium, spontaneous breaking of time translation symmetry can occur in
periodically driven, Floquet systems with discrete time-translation symmetry. The period of the resulting
discrete time crystal is quantized to an integer multiple of the drive period, arising from a combination of
collective synchronization and many body localization. Here, we consider a simple model for a onedimensional
discrete time crystal which explicitly reveals the rigidity of the emergent oscillations as the drive
is varied. We numerically map out its phase diagram and compute the properties of the dynamical phase
transition where the time crystal melts into a trivial Floquet insulator. Moreover, we demonstrate that
the model can be realized with current experimental technologies and propose a blueprint based upon a one
dimensional chain of trapped ions. Using experimental parameters (featuring long-range interactions), we
identify the phase boundaries o

[Just_Victor]

However, the "laws" of global warming are accepted without question.

Just like Einstein's equations made us reconsider Newton's Laws.  Science is frequently settled until we realize that it isn't.

[Free Vulcan]

Who do these guys think that they are? The science is settled. We do not let facts get in the way of the consensus of esteemed intellectual giants holding many PhD's and receiving a steady supply of govt grants. Global warming theory has proved this.

This is the kind of attitude that got Galileo in trouble.

[bolobaby]

"The period of the resulting discrete time crystal is quantized to an integer multiple of the drive period, arising from a combination of
collective synchronization and many body localization."

Does anyone else notice the similarity to one of the theories behind why the EM Drive works? Basically that quantizing causes step gains that result in, what appears, to be net energy gains. In the EM Drive's case, thrust without propellant. In this case, a system that appears to be perpetual.

Curious.

[Polly Ticks]

"The period of the resulting discrete time crystal is quantized to an integer multiple of the drive period, arising from a combination of
collective synchronization and many body localization."

Does anyone else notice the similarity to one of the theories behind why the EM Drive works? Basically that quantizing causes step gains that result in, what appears, to be net energy gains. In the EM Drive's case, thrust without propellant. In this case, a system that appears to be perpetual.

Curious.

And we're back to Douglas Adams!


In all seriousness, it is quite fascinating.  I'm not an engineer so I'm not following all the nuances of it, but the parts I do grasp are kind of amazing.

[Oceander]

Just like Einstein's equations made us reconsider Newton's Laws.  Science is frequently settled until we realize that it isn't.

Except that general relativity did not render Newtonian physics useless; it showed Newtonian physics to be a limited case of a broader set of space-time geometries. 

[Oceander]

"The period of the resulting discrete time crystal is quantized to an integer multiple of the drive period, arising from a combination of
collective synchronization and many body localization."

Does anyone else notice the similarity to one of the theories behind why the EM Drive works? Basically that quantizing causes step gains that result in, what appears, to be net energy gains. In the EM Drive's case, thrust without propellant. In this case, a system that appears to be perpetual.

Curious.

According to sources on the Wikipedia article about time crystals - which I have no reason to doubt at this point - they don't produce useable perpetual motion, if you will, and don't violate the laws of thermodynamics. 

[Just_Victor]

Except that general relativity did not render Newtonian physics useless; it showed Newtonian physics to be a limited case of a broader set of space-time geometries.

Relativity corrects all Newtonian calculations.  Just that on the scale of most of what we do in physics, the effects are negligible.

[Oceander]

Relativity corrects all Newtonian calculations.  Just that on the scale of most of what we do in physics, the effects are negligible.

Of course; which is to say that it essentially builds on top of it.  What it doesn't do is flatly contradict Newtonian physics. 

[Just_Victor]

Of course; which is to say that it essentially builds on top of it.  What it doesn't do is flatly contradict Newtonian physics.

Which is to say, "The science was settled, until we realized that it wasn't."

[Oceander]

Which is to say, "The science was settled, until we realized that it wasn't."

Which is not to say anything of the kind, certainly not with the connotations you so clearly wish to import. 

Newtonian physics was state of the art until relativity came along and improved upon it.  State of the art is not the same as settled. 

[Just_Victor]

Which is not to say anything of the kind, certainly not with the connotations you so clearly wish to import. 

Newtonian physics was state of the art until relativity came along and improved upon it.  State of the art is not the same as settled.

You are correct, 300 years of Newtonian physics being the state of the art, and in an instant relativity altered it.   Which is to say, "The science was settled, until we realized that it wasn't."

[EC]

Wondered where Sam Beckett had got to.

[Oceander]

You are correct, 300 years of Newtonian physics being the state of the art, and in an instant relativity altered it.   Which is to say, "The science was settled, until we realized that it wasn't."

Which is not at all to say that it is settled because that presupposes also a generally-accepted belief that there were no issues, no open questions, no "curiousities" and you haven't provided any reason for that assumption. 

You clearly don't know what the word means and ought not be prance by around as if you did. 

[Just_Victor]

Which is not at all to say that it is settled because that presupposes also a generally-accepted belief that there were no issues, no open questions, no "curiousities" and you haven't provided any reason for that assumption. 

You clearly don't know what the word means and ought not be prance by around as if you did.

It's another way of saying it's never settled.  Society may think it is, until we realize that it isn't.  You should heed your own advice.

[Oceander]

It's another way of saying it's never settled.  Society may think it is, until we realize that it isn't.  You should heed your own advice.

Whatever.  Go find a good dictionary. 

[Just_Victor]

Whatever.  Go find a good dictionary.

Yup.  Giving advice that you need more than anyone you're offering to.  Have a nice day.

[Oceander]

Is this what a time crystal feels like?