Quan­tum physics turned into tan­gi­ble re­al­ity

ETH physicists have developed a silicon wafer that behaves like a topological insulator when stimulated using ultrasound. They have thereby succeeded in turning an abstract theoretical concept into a macroscopic product.

The usual procedure goes like this: you have a complex physical system and attempt to explainitsbehaviour through as simple a model as possible. Sebastian Huber, Assistant Professor at the Institute for Theoretical Physics, has shown that this procedure also works in reverse: he develops macroscopic systems that exhibit exactly the same properties predicted by theory, but which have not yet been observed at this level.