For anyone who has studied physics in high school, the phrase double-slit experiment will definitely ring a bell. It is one of the most influential and groundbreaking experiments ever conducted in the study of light.
It was first conducted by Thomas Young, a British polymath (who also helped decipher the Rosetta stone), in 1801. Young set out to confirm Christian Huygens' wave theory of light, which was proposed in 1690. At the time, the light was thought to be made up of particles called photons, but Young proved that it also had wavelike properties.
This discovery was fundamental in our development and understanding of modern physics, especially quantum mechanics. Now, two centuries later, it is still proving to be a groundbreaking experiment.
"A double slit experiment is the first brick on the road to more complex temporal modulations, such as the much-sought time-crystal where the optical properties are temporally modulated in a periodic fashion.
This could have very important applications for light amplification, light control, for example, for computation, and maybe even quantum computation with light," said Romain Tirole, a Ph.D. student from Imperial College London, in an interview with IE. Tirole was part of a research team that explored the double-slit experiment using time.
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