{"id":221135,"date":"2025-08-29T03:21:40","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T08:21:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/how-a-superfluid-simultaneously-becomes-a-solid"},"modified":"2025-08-29T03:21:40","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T08:21:40","slug":"how-a-superfluid-simultaneously-becomes-a-solid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/how-a-superfluid-simultaneously-becomes-a-solid","title":{"rendered":"How a superfluid simultaneously becomes a solid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/how-a-superfluid-simultaneously-becomes-a-solid.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In everyday life, all matter exists as either a gas, liquid, or solid. In quantum mechanics, however, it is possible for two distinct states to exist simultaneously. An ultracold quantum system, for instance, can exhibit the properties of both a fluid and a solid at the same time.<\/p>\n<p>The Synthetic Quantum Systems research group at Heidelberg University has now demonstrated this phenomenon using a new experimental approach, by feeding a small amount of energy into a superfluid. They showed that, in a driven quantum system of this kind, <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/sound+waves\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">sound waves<\/a> propagate at two different speeds, which points toward coexisting liquid and solid states, a hallmark of supersolidity. The work is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41567-025-02927-4\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in the journal Nature Physics.<\/p>\n<p>This surprising and seemingly contradictory behavior of two states of matter existing at the same time does not occur at room temperature. But at ultralow temperatures, <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/quantum+mechanics\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">quantum mechanics<\/a> takes over, and matter can exhibit fundamentally different properties. When atoms are cooled to such low temperatures, their wave-like nature is dominant. If brought close enough together, many particles merge into one large wave, known as a Bose-Einstein condensate. This state is a superfluid, a fluid that flows without friction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In everyday life, all matter exists as either a gas, liquid, or solid. In quantum mechanics, however, it is possible for two distinct states to exist simultaneously. An ultracold quantum system, for instance, can exhibit the properties of both a fluid and a solid at the same time. The Synthetic Quantum Systems research group at [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,1617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-221135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-particle-physics","category-quantum-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221135\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}