News & Views in 2008

Analysis of the best available data on the behaviour of a large number of glass-forming organic liquids suggests that the widespread belief that a glass ceases to flow below its transition temperature could be wrong.

The ability to optically drive a single electron spin confined to a quantum dot from an absorbing state to a trapped coherent dark state could be the key to realizing optical switches and other quantum optical devices.

Inspired by ideas and techniques for cooling atomic gases, an experiment demonstrates how the temperature of micrometre-scale electronic devices can be lowered using solid-state quantum circuits.

When is a condensate really a condensate? Calculations reveal that a 'peak on a peak' structure should be considered the true signature of the emergence of a Bose condensate in a Bose–Hubbard optical lattice.

The ability to change the degree of hybridization of a donor electron between the coulombic potential of its donor atom and that of a nearby quantum well in a silicon transistor has now been achieved. This is a promising step in the development of atomic-scale quantum control.

A way to generate and control spin currents without magnetic fields or magnetic materials may be possible using dissipative quantum ratchets in the presence of spin–orbit coupling.

The motion of electrons inside, around and between atoms can be captured with attosecond time resolution. A technique has now been demonstrated that can reveal electron dynamics even without attosecond light flashes.

The ability to electrically control spin dynamics in quantum dots makes them one of the most promising platforms for solid-state quantum-information processing. Minimizing the influence of the nuclear spin environment is an important step towards realizing such promise.

Optomechanical set-ups use radiation pressure to manipulate macroscopic mechanical objects. Two experiments transfer this concept to the fields of superconducting microwave circuits and cold-atom physics.

Dark solitons in Bose–Einstein condensates have been made to live long enough for their dynamical properties to be observed. They might serve as a sensitive probe of the rich physics at the mesoscale.

Many have reported evidence for a quantum spin liquid state — in which quantum fluctuations prevent spin order — but thermodynamic evidence has been lacking, until now. Although it points the way, is it enough?

Gravitational wave detectors based on laser interferometry have reached an incredible level of sensitivity. But to develop to the level needed to explore the Universe, the next generation of detectors will probably need to use squeezed light.

The most precise calculations yet of how two quarks locked in a bound state annihilate have been achieved using lattice quantum chromodynamics — and signal a curious discrepancy.

The standard assumption in thermodynamics that a sufficiently slow change of external parameters will generate no entropy turns out to be wrong for low-dimensional, gapless systems. Its breakdown may be tested with ultracold gases.

Unprecedented control over the superposition of electronic states in a 'quantum corral', exerted by changing the position of a single atom within it, provides a powerful tool for studying the quantum behaviour of matter.