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Chill Factor
Researchers Freeze Gas Into New Matter Form

The Associated Press
W A S H I N G T O N, Sept. 10 — Researchers cooled fundamental particles to near absolute zero and created something called Fermi degenerate gas, a state of matter in which atoms act like waves instead of individual particles.
In a study reported in the journal Science, researchers at the JILA in Boulder, Colo., said the gas was cooled to the point where atoms were dominated by a basic state of matter called “quantum degeneracy.”
The condition is similar to Bose-Einstein condensate, a state of matter where bosons, one of two classes of fundamental particles, are chilled until they form a single atom. The Bose-Einstein condensate was first formed in 1995 by another team at JILA, which is a joint laboratory run by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Colorado.

Cool Idea
In the new study, researchers Deborah Jin and Brian DeMarco used potassium-40 atoms cooled to within 0.3 millionth of a degree above absolute zero, which is minus 459.67 degrees F, to study fermions, the other fundamental particle.
     At that temperature, fermions stop acting like individuals and start behaving as a unified wave.
     Dan Kleppner of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said in Science that the work “is a very significant achievement.”
     Experts said if the fermions can be cooled even further, they would form an atomic superconductor, a state where electricity flows without resistance. Fermion studies are considered particularly important because the very basic subatomic bits of matter — electrons, protons and neutrons — are all fermions.

S U M M A R Y

By cooling fundamental particles to near absolute zero, scientists have created a type of gas in which atoms act like waves instead of individual particles.