Processes in the X-ray interferometer: The path of a single photon (pink) passes through two slits simultaneously and spreads out behind them into a characteristic “interference pattern”. This pattern ...

The famous double-slit experiment, which demonstrated that light is both a wave and a particle, has been performed using “slits in time”. The techniques involved present a new way to manipulate light ...

Imperial physicists have recreated the famous double-slit experiment, which showed light behaving as particles and a wave, in time rather than space. The experiment relies on materials that can change ...

The concept of light has fascinated scientists for centuries. A recent MIT experiment has reignited the debate about its dual nature. The MIT team revisited a classic experiment with unprecedented ...

In day-to-day life, light seems intangible. We walk through it and create and extinguish it with the flip of a switch. But, like matter, light actually carries a little punch—it has momentum. Light ...

New research offers an intriguing variation on the famous experiment, which proved light behaves as both a particle and a wave. Reading time 2 minutes A team of physicists has recreated a classic ...

Schematic of the MIT experiment: Two single atoms floating in a vacuum chamber are illuminated by a laser beam and act as the two slits. The interference of the scattered light is recorded with a ...

Quantum physics is the realm of the strange. And one of the strangest discoveries in the field is also one of the most fundamental: Particles fired at barriers with two slits in them can act like ...

James is a published author with multiple pop-history and science books to his name. He specializes in history, space, strange science, and anything out of the ordinary.View full profile James is a ...

More than 200 years ago, the English scientist Thomas Young carried out a famous test known as the “double-slit experiment”. He shone a beam of light at a screen with two slits in it, and observed the ...

Thomas Young, born 250 years ago this week, was a polymath who made seminal contributions in fields from physics to Egyptology. But perhaps his most enduring legacy is proving Isaac Newton wrong about ...

I test a series of light experiments to explore reflection, refraction, and optical illusions, demonstrating how light behaves in surprising and educational ways. Coffee found to have startling effect ...