Researchers have recently produced a “human scale” demonstration of a new phase of matter called quadrupole topological insulators (QTI) that was recently predicted using theoretical physics. These were the first experimental findings to validate this theory. The researchers reported their findings in the journal Nature.
The team’s work with QTIs was born out of the decade-old understanding of the properties of a class of materials called topological insulators (TI). “TIs are electrical insulators on the inside and conductors along their boundaries, and may hold great potential for helping build low-power, robust computers and devices, all defined at the atomic scale”, said mechanical science and engineering professor and senior investigator Gaurav Bahl.
The uncommon properties of TIs make them a special form of electronic matter. “Collections of electrons can form their own phases within materials. These can be familiar solid, liquid and gas phases like water, but they can also sometimes form more unusual phases like a TI”, said co-author and physics professor Taylor Hughes .
However, there are still many theoretical predictions that need to be confirmed regarding TIs. One such prediction was the existence of a new type of TI having an electrical property known as a quadrupole moment. “Electrons are single particles that carry charge in a material”, said physics graduate student Wladimir Benalcazar. “We found that electrons in crystals can collectively arrange to give rise not only to charge dipole units – that is, pairings of positive and negative charges – but also high-order multipoles in which four or eight charges are brought together into a unit. The simplest member of these higher-order classes are quadrupoles in which two positive and two negative charges are coupled”. (1)
We keep on discovering new types of particles.
We keep on discovering new dimensions.
We keep on discovering new states of matter.
We keep on breaking the mirror of reality into pieces.
And the more we discover, the more we come to a great revelation.
What is dead, cannot die. What is alive, will be alive forever.
You cannot discover new dimensions of nothing.
You can never discover new states of matter.
You cannot discover many types of anything.
You cannot dissolve existence into zero.
You cannot break anything into smaller parts.
Unless there was nothing there in the first place…
Fallen souls we are… Meddling with ghosts… Handling shadows… Stop seeing, if you want to start sensing you. There is nothing more to discover about yourself. There is no way of dissecting your experience. You cannot analyze it more. You already know everything or anything about you. You are real. You are the light of the cosmos. An inner light. Shedding its powerful beams to the depths of your existence.
Until you decide to shed the light outside.
And the shadows begin to appear…
