Space glows with a soft warmth when you take a step.
The Fulling Davies Unruh effect is similar to the mysterious Hawking radiation that is thought to surround you.
It is the product of acceleration, not gravity.
Can you feel it? There is a good reason for that. To sense the weakest of Unruh rays, you would need to move at an impossible speed.
The effect is a purely theoretical phenomenon, far beyond our ability to measure. A discovery by researchers from the University of Waterloo in Canada and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology could change that.
The Unruh effect can be studied directly under less extreme conditions if there is a way to stimulation it.
They might have found the secret to turning matter invisible.
Experiments that aim to unite two incompatible theories in physics, one that describes how particles behave, the other that covers the curving of space and time, would be the real prize.
The theory of general relativity and the theory of quantum mechanics are currently at odds, but there has to be a unifying theory that describes how things function in the Universe.
We have been looking for a way to unite these two big theories, and this work is helping to move us closer by opening up opportunities for testing new theories against experiments.
The boundary of quantum laws and general relativity is where the Unruh effect sits.
An atom sitting alone in a vacuum would need to wait for a photon to hit it and jiggle its electrons before it could see.
There is a way to cheat. An atom could experience the smallest of wobbles in the surrounding field as low-energy photons, transformed by a kind of Doppler effect.
Waves in a quantum field and the jiggle of an atom's electrons rely on a shared timing in their frequencies. The paper on which they are written tends to balance them out in the long run, so any quantum effects that don't rely on timing are usually ignored.
When an atom is accelerated, these usually negligible conditions become much more significant and can actually take over as dominant effects.
By using a powerful laser to tick an atom in the right way, they showed it was possible to make use of alternative interactions to make moving atoms experience the Unruh effect without the need for large accelerations.
The team found that if the trajectory was right, an atom could turn transparent to incoming light, effectively suppressing its ability to absorb or emit light.
We might be able to come up with new ways to find where quantum physics and general relativity give way to a new theoretical framework by identifying ways to influence an atom's ability to engage with ripples in a vacuum.
For over 40 years, experiments have been hampered by the inability to explore the interface of quantum mechanics and gravity.
We can explore this interface in a laboratory setting. It could change everything if we can figure out some of the big questions.
The research was published in a journal.
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