Radio Cadena Agramonte emisiora de Camagüey
A team of physicists at New York City University experimentally demonstrated the existence of time mirrors, a phenomenon in which electromagnetic waves can reverse their flow in time.
When we look at our face in a mirror, we see a reflected image because electromagnetic light waves bounce off the surface of this material, giving rise to a phenomenon known as spatial reflection. However, scientists have theorized for decades about an alternative form of wave reflection, called temporal reflection.
This phenomenon arises when the properties of the medium through which the wave travels suddenly change throughout space, causing a portion of the wave to rewind in time and adopt a different frequency than the original. The main reason was that it was difficult to alter the optical properties of a material quickly in order to cause this phenomenon.
Testing the Mirrors of Time
To achieve this, the researchers used a metamaterial, a 6-meter-long metallic strip specially designed to modify the behavior of electromagnetic waves in unconventional ways. This object was integrated into a board and equipped with a network of electronic switches connected to backup capacitors.
By activating all the switches simultaneously, they suddenly doubled the impedance along the strip. This abrupt change in electromagnetic properties generated a temporal reflection, where the measured electromagnetic signals contained a time-reversed copy of the incoming signals.
The ability to reflect waves in time could be a breakthrough in the areas of communications and computing. According to Earth.com, the transmission of data in different ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum could be improved, as well as in the design of certain sensors and image systems.
Furthermore, this technology could be fundamental in the development of low-power optical wave-based computers. This finding was reported in an article published in the journal Nature Physics. (Text and photo: RT)
