Researchers have manipulated light to exhibit quantum backflow, a step towards understanding complex quantum mechanics and its practical applications in precision technologies.
Scientists at the University of Warsaw’s Faculty of Physics have superposed two light beams twisted in the clockwise direction to create anti-clockwise twists in the dark regions of the resultant superposition. The results of the research have been published in the prestigious journal Optica. This discovery has implications for the study of light-matter interactions and represents a step towards the observation of a peculiar phenomenon known as a quantum backflow.
“Imagine that you are throwing a tennis ball. The ball starts moving forward with positive momentum. If the ball doesn’t hit an obstacle, you are unlikely to expect it to suddenly change direction and come back to you like a boomerang,” notes Bohnishikha Ghosh, a doctoral student at the University of Warsaw’s Faculty of Physics. “When you spin such a ball clockwise, for example, you similarly expect it to keep spinning in the same direction.”
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