Scientists discover Sixth form of Matter
Almost every grade school kid learns about the first three phases of matter:
Solid ..... Liquid ...... Gas
Most respectable High School Science labs have samples of an element in each state,
and by HS Science class, most students know the fourth state of matter:
Plasma (the Sun, for example)
1995 introduced the world to a fifth state of matter:
Bose Einstein Condensate or BEC
BEC may be best known for it's ability to slow down light so you can bike faster than photons
click for info
see also Scientific American mirror, as well as UMich story, and even an interactive BEC Tutorial
Now we have news of a sixth state of matter:
Fermionic Condensates
also supercooled, also with seemingly strange superparticle and superfluid properties.
- the news broke a few weeks back, so apologies it this is old stuff to some,
just when we think we're caught up, damn scientists keep discovering new things again -
Time to rewrite a few more textbooks. Once they discover properties, that is.
Solid ..... Liquid ...... Gas
Most respectable High School Science labs have samples of an element in each state,
and by HS Science class, most students know the fourth state of matter:
Plasma (the Sun, for example)
1995 introduced the world to a fifth state of matter:
Bose Einstein Condensate or BEC
BEC may be best known for it's ability to slow down light so you can bike faster than photons
click for info
see also Scientific American mirror, as well as UMich story, and even an interactive BEC Tutorial
Now we have news of a sixth state of matter:
Fermionic Condensates
also supercooled, also with seemingly strange superparticle and superfluid properties.
- the news broke a few weeks back, so apologies it this is old stuff to some,
just when we think we're caught up, damn scientists keep discovering new things again -
Time to rewrite a few more textbooks. Once they discover properties, that is.
Comments
It's strange stuff, no doubt about it.
Does it dissolve in my iced tea better than sugar?
Hero: "No, I have you defeated now Dr. Branard!"
Dr. Branard "Not when I have...Matter X! Muhahahaha!"
Hero: "Oh no! Not Matter X!"
(sorry, couldn't help it. hope there aren't any closet-jayhawks lurking around here)
Originally posted by Randycat99
How about "jello" and "slurpy" for the 2 new states?
You got my vote.
Hmm.. see what happens when I get up too early? *sigh*
Originally posted by Anders
You got my vote.
I dunno... I've always felt Marshmallow Fluf deserved to be classified as a separate form of matter. Not precisely solid, not precisely liquid and a little bit of gas thrown in for good measure.
Originally posted by curiousuburb
<snip>
Sweet...
Originally posted by iBrowse
Will new age Wiccans adjust their believes to accommodate for this?
There is far more to that aspect of occultism than you are apparently aware of.
Originally posted by Randycat99
How about "jello" and "slurpy" for the 2 new states?
how about twinky as well?
Shaken for the bose-einstein condensate.
stirred for the fermionic condensate.
i only knew the first three.
Originally posted by DiscoCow
The cool thing is when two of these matter-waves are ?mixed? together, they form interference patterns. And I know this is far fetched (okay, probably impossible seeing as the canceled out ?atoms? are just moved somewhere?s else), but if somehow they could use the wave like properties to create bands with negative energy density, and then find a way to use said exotic matter --voila! easy timespace manipulation!
This is what I was wondering. I think it was more BEC I was reading about and it was talking about canceling out atoms. Well can someone explain this in more detail? They said it isn't canceled by moved to another place...does it actually change place or does it just seem like that? How does it change place then...and how fast? I was thinking about somewhat timespace manipulation...though not easy