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Feynman’s double-slit experiment brought to life
The precise methodology of Richard Feynman’s famous double-slit thought-experiment – a cornerstone of quantum mechanics that showed how electrons behave as both a particle and a wave – has been followed in full for the very first time.
Although the particle-wave duality of electrons has been demonstrated in a number of different ways since Feynman popularised the idea in 1965, none of the experiments have managed to fully replicate the methodology set out in Volume 3 of Feynman’s famous Lectures on Physics.
“The technology to do this experiment has been around for about two decades; however, to do a nice data recording of electrons takes some serious effort and has taken us three years,” said lead author of the study Professor Herman Batelaan from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
“Previous double-slit experiments have successfully demonstrated the mysterious properties of electrons, but none have done so using Feynman’s methodology, specifically the opening and closing of both slits at will and the ability to detect electrons one at a time.
“Akira Tonomura’s brilliant experiment used a thin, charged wire to split electrons and bring them back together again, instead of two slits in a wall which was proposed by Feynman. To the best of my knowledge, the experiments by Guilio Pozzi were the first to use nano-fabricated slits in a wall; however, the slits were covered up by stuffing them with material so could not be open and closed automatically.”
In their experiments, which have been published today, Thursday 14 March, in the Institute of Physics and German Physical Society’s New Journal of Physics, Batelaan and his team, along with colleagues at the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics, created a modern representation of Feynman’s experiment by directing an electron beam, capable of firing individual electrons, at a wall made of a gold-coated silicon membrane.
The wall had two 62-nm-wide slits in it with a centre-to-centre separation of 272 nm. A 4.5 µm wide and 10 µm tall moveable mask, controlled by a piezoelectric actuator, was placed behind the wall and slid back and forth to cover the slits.
“We’ve created an experiment where both slits can be mechanically opened and closed at will and, most importantly, combined this with the capability of detecting one electron at a time.
“It is our task to turn every stone when it comes to the most fundamental experiments that one can do. We have done exactly that with Feynman’s famous thought-experiment and have been able to illustrate the key feature of quantum mechanics,” continued Batelaan.
Feynman’s double-slit experiment
In Feynman’s double-slit thought-experiment, a specific material is randomly directed at a wall which has two small slits that can be opened and closed at will – some of the material gets blocked and some passes through the slits, depending on which ones are open.Based on the pattern that is detected beyond the wall on a backstop – which is fitted with a detector – one can discern whether the material coming through behaves as either a wave or particle.
When particles are fired at the wall with both slits open, they are more likely to hit the backstop in one particular area, whereas waves interfere with each other and hit the backstop at a number of different points with differing strength, creating what is known as an interference pattern.
In 1965, Feynman popularised that electrons – historically thought to be particles – would actually produce the pattern of a wave in the double-split experiment.
Unlike sound waves and water waves, Feynman highlighted that when electrons are fired at the wall one at a time, an interference pattern is still produced. He went on to say that this phenomenon “has in it the heart of quantum physics [but] in reality, it contains the only mystery.”
(via dianaprincexxx)
Dwarf Galaxy Size Comparison Chart
A size comparison of .. well Dwarf Galaxies! Zoom in here
If anyone missed the previous size comparison chart “How Big Are Galaxies?” then definitially check that out here or here.
Credit: Rhys Taylor
(via thescienceofreality)
WELCOME TO JAZZLAND - NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA
In August of 2009, Ray Nagin, then mayor of New Orleans, announced that kids’ entertainment channel Nickelodeon signed a deal to redevelop Six Flags of New Orleans into the TV channel’s first stand-alone theme park.
“This is huge,” he said. “I don’t know what we could have done better… I don’t know if we could have found a better partner. Anyone who owns land in New Orleans east is probably sitting pretty good right now.”
In the mid-’90s, the city of New Orleans took out loans totaling $25.3 million dollar from the Department of Housing and Urban Development to construct the park. Jazzland, its original moniker, opened with much fanfare in 2000. It only operated for two seasons before filing for bankruptcy. A few years later, desperate to find a company to take over operations, the city added on some $15 million in additional loans to help finance Six Flags’ takeover. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina left the park stewing in 12 feet of floodwaters for two weeks. Abandoned and decaying, the park sits in the marshes of New Orleans East, the tops of its roller coasters visible for miles.
The Nickelodeon deal required an initial investment of $165 million dollars. Financing hinged on capturing Gulf Opportunity Zone Bonds (GO Zone Bonds), a federal program that offered low interest rates to businesses investing in storm damaged areas of New Orleans. Despite the endorsement of the city’s Industrial Development Board, the bonds never came through, and the developers did not secure other financing options. Nickelodeon dropped the project within a few months.
Other discarded plans include everything from a baseball complex to a water park. The most recent redevelopment scheme was an upscale outlet mall, complete with a boardwalk where patrons could ride on the remaining roller coasters. Approved by the city in March of 2012, the $40 million dollar mall would be largely paid for with tax increment financing (TIF). TIF is a form of public-private financing where the up-front development costs are subsidized by public entities, creating long term municipal debt. This debt is then paid for by the anticipated tax revenues generated by the redevelopment once it reenters commercial activity. The majority of the sales taxes and increased property taxes would go towards debt repayment rather than city or state coffers.
At a public meeting debuting plans for the mall, some residents pushed back on using TIF dollars. According to the Times Picayune, David Garcia, a lead developer of the project, responded that anyone claiming to be able to redevelop Jazzland without TIF was “lacking in either expertise or honesty.” The site is too damaged and risky for developers to be willing to wholly finance any project themselves, he added. Ultimately, the debate was moot. The plans were dead a year later. The city would instead support building an outlet mall on the Mississippi River, less than half a mile from the French Quarter and 17 miles from Jazzland.
Before the storm, Jazzland was an economic loss for the city. Now it’s an economic drain, siphoning funds without even providing jobs. Currently, New Orleans pays $1 million dollars annually on the original construction loan. Meanwhile, city funding for children’s athletics, the library, and substance abuse counselors gets slashed due to a protracted budget crisis.
The arguments for redevelopment mirror the arguments for building such a monument in the first place—we need jobs, we need development in the East. But if it’s true what David Garcia said—that rebuilding Jazzland necessarily means leveraging TIF dollars, mushrooming municipal debt and earmarking taxes away from public ledgers—then it seems like a poor bet for anyone to make, especially for the city. Redevelopment could mean New Orleans over-extends itself financially again. Another natural disaster or bankruptcy would leave the city with a bigger annual debt payment, and kick off another round of redevelopment roulette, with firms trotting out new proposals. No matter what glittering designs the plans depict, though, the promises will be the same: jobs, tourist dollars, and higher property taxes for everyone in the East. The question is whether or not low wage jobs, which dominate the labor economy of shopping malls and theme parks, are worth the price of admission.
* * *
Breonne DeDecker was born near the headwaters of the Mississippi River and now resides at the end of it. She has degrees in photography and sustainable development. Currently, she is working with partner Darin Acosta on The Airline is a Very Long Road—an experimental biography of Louisiana, which you can find at airlinehighway.tumblr.com.
Exhibit: Decaying City
Via Fast Company, a fascinating exhibit by theater set designer Johanna Mårtensson, demonstrates…
Comparison of Alaska to the mainland US
Aqua regia, literally meaning “King’s water”, is a highly corrosive mixture of acids; it is the only mixture of acids that can dissolve gold.
Hungarian chemist George de Hevesy dissolved the nobel prizes of his peers in aqua regia during the German invasion of Denmark in WWII to prevent Nazis from looting the prizes. He placed the liquid solution of gold and aqua regia in plain sight where it was overlooked. After the war had ended, de Hevesy returned to precipitate the gold out of the mixture. He then returned the gold back to the Nobel Foundation where it was then cast back into its original shape. (img)
(via astro-stoner)
HIGH LINE PARK
Architects: Diller Scofidio + Renfro
Landscape architects : James Corner Field Operations
Location: Manhattan’s West Side, USA
Project Start: 2009
Project Complete: 2011
(via nycinspiration)
Side B by Frank Martell
The Size of a Nano
Just how small is a “nano?” In the International System of Units, the prefix “nano” means one-billionth, or 10-9; therefore one nanometer is one-billionth of a meter. It’s difficult to imagine just how small that is, so here are some examples:
- A sheet of paper is about 100,000 nanometers thick
- A strand of human DNA is 2.5 nanometers in diameter
- There are 25,400,000 nanometers in one inch
- A human hair is approximately 80,000-100,000 nanometers wide
- A single gold atom is about a third of a nanometer in diameter
- On a comparative scale, if the diameter of a marble was one nanometer, then diameter of the Earth would be about one meter
- One nanometer is about as long as your fingernail grows in one second
(via understandingtheuniverse)
(Source: iamdysthymia83, via ihateallyourgods)
