Editorials & Other Articles

Bill USA

(6,436 posts) Tue Oct 9, 2012, 05:50 PM Oct 2012

Nobel Prize in Physics to be shared by a GOVERNMENT scientist.

Wineland managed to make an atom occupy two places in space at the same time, by shining just the right amount of light on it for precisely the right amount of time. This is called super-positioning in Quantum Mechanics but it's only supposed to be possible on the subatomic level. Wineland did it with a whole atom.

http://news.yahoo.com/nobel-prize-being-two-places-once-144000268.html

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. physicist David Wineland and France's Serge Haroche share the 2012 Nobel Prize in physics for doing what Wineland once described as a scientific parlour trick.

What they did was apply one of the most successful theories in physics - quantum mechanics, which for a century has governed the micro-world where even an atom looms large - to objects in the lab.

[font size="+1"]A physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, part of the U.S. Commerce Department, Wineland was cited for trapping electrically-charged atoms, or ions, and controlling and measuring them with light particles, or photons.[/font]

Haroche of the College de France did similar work.
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3 replies

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Nobel Prize in Physics to be shared by a GOVERNMENT scientist. (Original Post) Bill USA Oct 2012 OP

Capitalism would not fund such work without the expectation of profits & if it did, it would then patrice Oct 2012 #1

Shouldn't government science laboratories be shrunk to fit a bathtub? jsr Oct 2012 #2

Thank you Nobel Committee locks Oct 2012 #3

patrice

(47,992 posts)

1. Capitalism would not fund such work without the expectation of profits & if it did, it would then

Reply to Bill USA (Original post)

Tue Oct 9, 2012, 05:57 PM

Oct 2012

claim to OWN the results.

jsr

(7,712 posts)

2. Shouldn't government science laboratories be shrunk to fit a bathtub?

Reply to Bill USA (Original post)

Tue Oct 9, 2012, 07:30 PM

Oct 2012

locks

(2,012 posts)

3. Thank you Nobel Committee

Reply to Bill USA (Original post)

Tue Oct 9, 2012, 08:09 PM

Oct 2012

In Boulder we are so proud to live in a community of people and government institutes like David Wineland and NIST where the value of good science and good research is recognized. And to have outstanding teachers who pass on their knowledge to the young people in our universities. Unfortunately these public agencies and education are already being severely cut and if the Repubs have their way they may be replaced by for profit corporations but never matched.

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