LIVESTREAM Nothing goes faster than light... usually!

Join Professor Lene Vestergaard Hau (Harvard University) for the Dirac Lecture, hosted by Professor Paul Monroe (Deputy Dean - Research, UNSW School of Science Materials and Engineering).

The lecture will explore how Lene and her team have slowed, stopped and restarted light. The observations represent the ultimate control over the inter-conversion of light and matter, and point to novel paradigms for quantum information processing.

"In our laboratory, we have used ultra-cold atom clouds to slow light pulses to the speed of a bicycle, which is 50 million times lower than the light speed in a vacuum. In the process, a light pulse spatially compresses by the same large factor, from 1 km to only 0.02 mm, and the pulse can then be completely stopped and later restarted.

From here, we have taken matters further: stopped and extinguished a light pulse in one part of space and revived it in a completely different location. In the process, the light pulse is converted to a perfect matter copy that can be stored – put on the shelf – sculpted, and then turned back to light. The storage time can be many seconds, and during this time light could – under normal circumstances – travel back and forth to the Moon several times over."