Nanoparticle trapped with laser light temporarily violates second law of thermodynamics
25 replies, posted
[I]Objects with sizes in the nanometer range, such as the molecular building blocks of living cells or nanotechnological devices, are continuously exposed to random collisions with surrounding molecules. In such fluctuating environments the fundamental laws of thermodynamics that govern our macroscopic world need to be rewritten. Scientists found that a nanoparticle trapped with laser light temporarily violates the famous second law of thermodynamics, something that is impossible on human time and length scale.[/I]
[img]http://images.sciencedaily.com/2014/03/140331130848-large.jpg[/img]
[I]This is an artistic impression of the nanoparticle in a laser trap.[/I]
[quote=sciencedaily]
Surprises at the nanoscale
Watching a movie played in reverse often makes us laugh because unexpected and mysterious things seem to happen: glass shards lying on the floor slowly start to move towards each other, magically assemble and suddenly an intact glass jumps on the table where it gently gets to a halt. Or snow starts to from a water puddle in the sun, steadily growing until an entire snowman appears as if molded by an invisible hand. When we see such scenes, we immediately realize that according to our everyday experience something is out of the ordinary. Indeed, there are many processes in nature that can never be reversed. The physical law that captures this behavior is the celebrated second law of thermodynamics, which posits that the entropy of a system -- a measure for the disorder of a system -- never decreases spontaneously, thus favoring disorder (high entropy) over order (low entropy).
However, when we zoom into the microscopic world of atoms and molecules, this law softens up and looses its absolute strictness. Indeed, at the nanoscale the second law can be fleetingly violated. On rare occasions, one may observe events that never happen on the macroscopic scale such as, for example heat transfer from cold to hot which is unheard of in our daily lives. Although on average the second law of thermodynamics remains valid even in nanoscale systems, scientists are intrigued by these rare events and are investigating the meaning of irreversibility at the nanoscale.[/quote]
[url="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/03/140331130848.htm"]Make sure to read the rest in the source[/url]
Found it interesting
Take that evolution!
the thing to take away from the article
[quote]However, when we zoom into the microscopic world of atoms and molecules, this law softens up and looses its absolute strictness. Indeed, at the nanoscale the second law can be fleetingly violated. On rare occasions, one may observe events that never happen on the macroscopic scale such as, for example heat transfer from cold to hot which is unheard of in our daily lives. Although on average the second law of thermodynamics remains valid even in nanoscale systems, scientists are intrigued by these rare events and are investigating the meaning of irreversibility at the nanoscale.[/quote]
TLDR:
They suspended a tiny glass sphere with lasers
They cooled the glass sphere so that it was cooler than its surroundings
After they stopped cooling it and let the sphere warm back up, it would occasionally actually get colder instead of warmer
Science broke [B][I]everything[/I][/B]
Lasers can create particles, now they can break laws of thermodynamics. What can't they do?
[QUOTE=Novangel;44420150]Lasers can create particles, now they can break laws of thermodynamics. What can't they do?[/QUOTE]
Not be awesome.
[QUOTE=Novangel;44420150]Lasers can create particles, now they can break laws of thermodynamics. What can't they do?[/QUOTE]
Cure cancer?
[QUOTE=Novangel;44420150]Lasers can create particles, now they can break laws of thermodynamics. What can't they do?[/QUOTE]
be as cool as graphene
[QUOTE=Psychokitten;44420201]Cure cancer?[/QUOTE]
[URL="http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Therapy/lasers"]Bitch please.[/url]
[editline]2nd April 2014[/editline]
Fuckkk youuu larparnarr
So when is it going to trial? I hope they give it the chair. Monster.
[QUOTE=onebit;44420267]What is laser made of?[/QUOTE]
photons?
God, I never know if the articles are real on this fucking date
Because this seems like a pretty major scientific discovery if real.
[QUOTE=Doom64hunter;44420327]God, I never know if the articles are real on this fucking date
Because this seems like a pretty major scientific discovery if real.[/QUOTE]
here you go
[URL]http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nnano.2014.40.html[/URL]
Was there any reason to the think that the laws of thermodynamics would hold at such as small scale in the first place?
[QUOTE=Krinkels;44420380]Was there any reason to the think that the laws of thermodynamics would hold at such as small scale in the first place?[/QUOTE]
Yes.
No laws of physics were broken here. The universe is a massive lump of probability distributions wherein even the seemingly impossible (read: very unlikely) [I]do[/I] in fact, happen. The law still holds true for the average.
[editline]1st April 2014[/editline]
Like, I cannot stress this enough; the laws of thermodynamics is currently the holy grail of physics. If you could disprove gravity and relativity then good on you, but you still wouldn't have a chance at thermodynamics.
[QUOTE=nuttyboffin;44420168]Not be awesome.[/QUOTE]
[img]http://facepunch.com/image.php?u=255149&dateline=1388539367[/img]
Where is Johnnymo1 when we need him
[QUOTE=Hat-Wearing Man;44420580]Where is Johnnymo1 when we need him[/QUOTE]
I think EvacX did a pretty good job explaining this one
Real violations of the second law of thermodynamics don't exist because the second law of thermodynamics is a statistical fact, but that also means momentary violations shouldn't be at all surprising.
[QUOTE=onebit;44420267]What is laser made of?[/QUOTE]
i want to eat one and gain its powers
[QUOTE=Psychokitten;44420201]Cure cancer?[/QUOTE]
Well, actually, if you apply a low intensity IR laser to a tumour that's been filled with gold nanoshells you can actually burn out the tumour without harming surrounding tissues.
This might be a scientist April fools joke guys.
[QUOTE=ClarkWasHere;44420992]This might be a scientist April fools joke guys.[/QUOTE]
I'm pretty sure Nature isn't big on those.
[QUOTE=onebit;44420267]What is laser made of?[/QUOTE]
The term laser stands for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation. Basically its a device which encourages the emission of photons - or other forms of electromagnetic radiation -- from atoms by introducing them to some form of energy. The energy is usually just supplied as an electrical current.
So basically when this supplied energy meets the atoms it causes more photons to be released. LASERs usually have two mirror like objects on either side (with a small gap) to reflect the emitted photons back and forth which creates more and more emitted waves, eventually having many escape through the gap.
I hope that kinda answers your question. To be honest, I didn't really put things in a manner any more easy to absorb than, say, Wikipedia.
[QUOTE=ClarkWasHere;44420992]This might be a scientist April fools joke guys.[/QUOTE]
Published on March 31
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