Some quantum particles gotta get right back to where they started from.
Physicists have confirmed a theoretically predicted phenomenon called the quantum boomerang effect. An experiment reveals that, after being given a nudge, particles in certain materials return to their starting points, on average, researchers report in a paper accepted in Physical Review X.
Particles can boomerang if they’re in a material that has lots of disorder. Instead of a pristine material made up of orderly arranged atoms, the material must have many defects, such as atoms that are missing or misaligned, or other types of atoms sprinkled throughout.
In 1958, physicist Philip Anderson realized that with enough disorder, electrons in a material become localized: They get stuck in place, unable to travel very far from where they started. The pinned-down electrons prevent the material from conducting electricity, thereby turning what might otherwise be a metal into an insulator. That localization is also necessary for the boomerang effect.
To picture the boomerang in action, physicist David Weld of the University of California, Santa Barbara imagines shrinking himself down and slipping inside a disordered material. If he tries to fling away an electron, he says, “it will not only turn around and come straight back to me, it’ll come right back to me and stop.” (Actually, he says, in this sense the electron is “more like a dog than a boomerang.” The boomerang will keep going past you if you don’t catch it, but a well-trained dog will sit by your side.)
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