Eighty-five years ago, mathematician and physicist Hermann Weyl proposed the existence of a highly elusive, massless particle. Later known as the Weyl particle, it would allow the development of faster and more efficient electronics because of a unique propensity for reacting like matter and antimatter inside of a crystal. Just recently, an international team run by Princeton University scientists discovered this Weyl particle.
NEW EUPHORIA-INDUCING DISCOVERY
Their findings were published in the journal Science on July 16th. In it, they anticipate that if Weyl fermions are used in the development of next-gen electronics, we could have access to a free and practically perfectly efficient flow of electricity in electronic devices. Weyl particles would greatly increase the power potential for devices like the computer in your hand(s) right now.
DESIRE FOR SPEEDY QUANTUMS
Scientists and theorists have ravenously sought particles with such properties because they were posited as a kind of fundamental building block of subatomic particles, of an even more basic nature than negatively-charged electrons we’ve already been long familiar with. Since Weyl fermions are so fundamental, they might provide an incredibly stable and efficient means for conducting particles. But why replace electrons if they already do the job we desire?
IF IT AIN’T BROKE, MAYbe IT’S TOO SLOW, DUDE
Electrons possess mass, and however minuscule this is, mass does slow movement, specifically, acceleration. Conversely, since a Weyl fermion is massless, it is extremely mobile because its spin is both in the same and opposite direction of its motion (i.e., as physicists know it, both right-and-left-handed).
A corresponding author named M. Zahid Hasan, who’s also a Princeton professor of Physics and leader of the research team, commented that “[t]he physics of the Weyl fermion are so strange, there could be many things that arise from this particle that we’re just not capable of imagining now.”
SIMILAR PARTICLES DIFFICULT TO PRODUCE
Weyl fermions are not that unique. Other particles with similar properties, like the Higgs boson, possess the same propensities, but are only observable for a short time in the instant following artificially induced particle collisions. The Weyl fermion was observed inside a synthetic metallic crystal known as tantalum arsenide, which was designed by the Princeton team in conjunction to other researchers at the Collaborative Innovation Center of Quantum Matter in Beijing, and at National Taiwan University.
PRELIMINARY CONCLUSIONS
The Weyl particle will be revolutionary for many fields. For starters, says Hans, we will develop efficient quantum computing at a much quicker pace. In addition, as stated before, the Weyl particle’s ability to work as a monopole and antimonopole simultaneously means that two Weyl particles with opposite charges can move independently of each other, regardless of charge.
REPLICATED EFFECT
What’s more, Weyl fermions are also capable of creating massless electrons that can move, or when electrons are lost due to collision with extraneous objects, is a major drawback to efficiency, and also generates heat (which is always a drag, plus a great pun). Instead of leaving scientists lost to such trifle mishaps, Weyl electrons move around or even through any obstructions.
“It’s like they have their own GPS and steer themselves without scattering,” Hasan continues to explicate. “They will move and move only in one direction since they are either right-handed or left-handed and never come to an end because they just tunnel through. These are every fast electrons that behave like unidirectional light beams that can be used for new types of quantum computing.”
So, in a word, the Weyl particle is cool beans, man, cool beans.
