The physical properties of the matter we are creating are relevant to the conditions inside large planets, and we also hope that by studying it we can gain a greater understanding of what is going on during the creation of ‘miniature stars’ created by high-power laser implosions, which may one day allow the power of nuclear fusion to be harnessed here on Earth.’ [Other than that, it is a great day in toyland.]

Taken from an article in ScienceDaily: Transparent Aluminum Is ‘New State Of Matter’

The discovery was made possible with the development of a new source of radiation that is ten billion times brighter than any synchrotron in the world … [One wonders how bright that is in the SI standard of football fields.]

The Oxford team, along with their international colleagues, focused all this power down into a spot with a diameter less than a twentieth of the width of a human hair. [Ah~! Asked and answered – a football field to a human hair is recognizable at 10^-18]

Whilst the invisible effect lasted for only an extremely brief period – an estimated 40 femtoseconds – …

Professor Wark added: ‘What is particularly remarkable about our experiment is that we have turned ordinary aluminium into this exotic new material…

The researchers believe that the new approach is an ideal way to create and study such exotic states of matter…fusion. [Gotta include fusion.]

A report of the research, ‘Turning solid aluminium transparent by intense soft X-ray photoionization’, is published in Nature Physics. The research was carried out by an international team led by Oxford University scientists Professor Justin Wark, Dr Bob Nagler, Dr Gianluca Gregori, William Murphy, Sam Vinko and Thomas Whitcher. Adapted from materials provided by University of Oxford.

Read the entire article at: Transparent Aluminum Is ‘New State Of Matter’