Video: Scientists lock a disk in air with quantum levitation

Video: Scientists lock a disk in air with quantum levitation

October 24, 2011 By Jeffrey Van Camp


Science
has brought us one step closer to hoverboards and floating islands. In
this video, scientists demonstrate quantum levitation, which can lock an
object in mid air where you can move it and adjust it as if its sitting
on clay.
If you want to see something strange,
you’ve come to the right place. Using a technology called “quantum
trapping,” scientists can now make an object levitated in the air above a
magnet. More interesting, it’s locked to the magnet so well that its
position in the air can be moved and it will stay in place, almost as if
it’s sitting on a table or an invisible stand of clay or something.
Discovery
explains the technique, which basically involved cooling a ceramic disk
until it hits -301 degrees Fahrenheit (-185 Celsius) at which point it
turns into a superconductor, meaning it conducts electricity without
resistance and with no energy loss. When you put a superconductor near a
magnet, it expels the magnetic field out of it (usually a magnetic
field travels through something). This is called the Meissner effect.
However, since this disk is super thin, small, concentrated beams of
magnetic field energy does penetrate the disk and kind of holds it in
place. You can turn it upside down, move the object, etc. It just stays
in mid air exactly how you place it. (Read more about the science here.)
The
first video below demonstrates the concept and the second video shows
how it works along with some really cool demonstrations like a disc
flying around a track. I think we’ve finally figured out how those pesky
UFOs stay up in the air.
http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/video-scientists-lock-a-disk-in-air-with-quantum-levitation/

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