A new means of producing three-dimensional light fields is allowing researchers to manipulate electrons into quantum states once thought impossible, according to newly published research.
The breakthrough, reported in a new study by physicists at the University of Oldenburg, points to new ways for scientists to control interactions between light and matter, as well as investigate quantum processes that could have significant implications for medicine and other fields.
According to the team behind the new research, their achievement involved the combination of two specially-shaped ultrashort bursts of light, known as femtosecond laser pulses, with each beam possessing a different color and lasting just a few millionths of a billionth of a second.
Directing these colored beams at a single point of intersection produced controllable light fields, which they say oscillate in all three spatial dimensions.
“With our method, we can generate electronic quantum states that have previously only been described theoretically and also make them spatially visible,” said Dr. Matthias Wollenhaupt, who led the recent research.
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