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Femtotechnology
Femtotechnology is a hypothetical term used in reference to structuring of matter on the scale of a femtometer, which is 10−15 m. This is a smaller scale in comparison with nanotechnology and picotechnology which refer to 10−9 m and 10−12 m respectively. Theory Work in the femtometer range involves manipulation of excited energy states within atomic nuclei, specifically nuclear isomers, to produce metastable (or otherwise stabilized) states with unusual properties. In the extreme case, excited states of the individual nucleons that make up the atomic nucleus ( protons and neutrons) are considered, ostensibly to tailor the behavioral properties of these particles. The most advanced form of molecular nanotechnology is often imagined to involve self-replicating molecular machines, and there have been some speculations suggesting something similar might be possible with analogues of molecules composed of nucleons rather than atoms. For example, the astrophysic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Picotechnology
The term picotechnology is a portmanteau of picometre and technology, intended to parallel the term nanotechnology. It is a hypothetical future level of technological manipulation of matter, on the scale of trillionths of a metre or picoscale (10−12). This is three orders of magnitude smaller than a nanometre (and thus most nanotechnology) and two orders of magnitude smaller than most chemistry transformations and measurements. Picotechnology would involve the manipulation of matter at the atomic level. A further hypothetical development, femtotechnology, would involve working with matter at the subatomic level. Applications Picoscience is a term used by some futurists to refer to structuring of matter on a true picometre scale. Picotechnology was described as involving the alteration of the structure and chemical properties of individual atoms, typically through the manipulation of energy states of electrons within an atom to produce metastable (or otherwise stabilized) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mode-locking
Mode locking is a technique in optics by which a laser can be made to produce pulses of light of extremely short duration, on the order of picoseconds (10−12 s) or femtoseconds (10−15 s). A laser operated in this way is sometimes referred to as a femtosecond laser, for example, in modern refractive surgery. The basis of the technique is to induce a fixed phase relationship between the longitudinal modes of the laser's resonant cavity. Constructive interference between these modes can cause the laser light to be produced as a train of pulses. The laser is then said to be "phase-locked" or "mode-locked". Laser cavity modes Although laser light is perhaps the purest form of light, it is not of a single, pure frequency or wavelength. All lasers produce light over some natural bandwidth or range of frequencies. A laser's bandwidth of operation is determined primarily by the gain medium from which the laser is constructed, and the range of frequencies over which a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Femtochemistry
Femtochemistry is the area of physical chemistry that studies chemical reactions on extremely short timescales (approximately 10−15 seconds or one femtosecond, hence the name) in order to study the very act of atoms within molecules (reactants) rearranging themselves to form new molecules (products). In a 1988 issue of the journal ''Science'', Ahmed Hassan Zewail published an article using this term for the first time, stating "Real-time femtochemistry, that is, chemistry on the femtosecond timescale...". Later in 1999, Zewail received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his pioneering work in this field showing that it is possible to see how atoms in a molecule move during a chemical reaction with flashes of laser light. Application of femtochemistry in biological studies has also helped to elucidate the conformational dynamics of stem-loop RNA structures. Many publications have discussed the possibility of controlling chemical reactions by this method, but this remains contr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Attophysics
Attosecond physics, also known as attophysics, or more generally attosecond science, is a branch of physics that deals with light-matter interaction phenomena wherein attosecond (10−18 s) photon pulses are used to unravel dynamical processes in matter with unprecedented time resolution. Attosecond science mainly employs pump–probe spectroscopic methods to investigate the physical process of interest. Due to the complexity of this field of study, it generally requires a synergistic interplay between state-of-the-art experimental setup and advanced theoretical tools to interpret the data collected from attosecond experiments. The main interests of attosecond physics are: # Atomic physics: investigation of electron correlation effects, photo-emission delay and ionization tunneling. # Molecular physics and molecular chemistry: role of electronic motion in molecular excited states (e.g. charge-transfer processes), light-induced photo-fragmentation, and light-induced electron t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Femtometre
The helium atom and perspective Magnitude (mathematics)">magnitudes The femtometre (American spelling femtometer) symbol fm derived from the μέτρον">metrοn, lit=unit of measurement) is a unit of Italian Americans">Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi, as it is a typical length-scale of nuclear physics. Definition and equivalents 1000000 zeptometres = 1 femtometre = 1 fermi = 0.000001 nanometre = femtometres = 1 millimetre. For example, the charge radius of a proton is approximately 0.841 femtometres while the radius of a gold nucleus is approximately 8.45 femtometres. 1 barn = 100 fm2 History The femtometre was adopted by the 11th ''Conférence Générale des Poids et Mesures'', and added to the SI in 1964, using the Danish word for "15" and the similarity in spelling with ''fermi''. The fermi is named after the Italian physicist Enrico Fermi (1901–1954), one of the founders of nuclear physics. The term was coined by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Science Fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imagination, imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, Parallel universes in fiction, parallel universes, extraterrestrials in fiction, extraterrestrial life, sentient artificial intelligence, cybernetics, certain forms of immortality (like mind uploading), and the technological singularity, singularity. Science fiction List of existing technologies predicted in science fiction, predicted several existing inventions, such as the atomic bomb, robots, and borazon, whose names entirely match their fictional predecessors. In addition, science fiction might serve as an outlet to facilitate future scientific and technological innovations. Science fiction can trace its roots to ancient mythology. It is also related to fantasy, Horror fiction, horror, and superhero fiction and contains many #Subgenres, sub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ultrashort Pulse
In optics, an ultrashort pulse, also known as an ultrafast event, is an electromagnetic pulse whose time duration is of the order of a picosecond (10−12 second) or less. Such pulses have a broadband optical spectrum, and can be created by mode-locked oscillators. Amplification of ultrashort pulses almost always requires the technique of chirped pulse amplification, in order to avoid damage to the gain medium of the amplifier. They are characterized by a high peak intensity (or more correctly, irradiance) that usually leads to nonlinear interactions in various materials, including air. These processes are studied in the field of nonlinear optics. In the specialized literature, "ultrashort" refers to the femtosecond (fs) and picosecond (ps) range, although such pulses no longer hold the record for the shortest pulses artificially generated. Indeed, x-ray pulses with durations on the attosecond time scale have been reported. The 1999 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greg Egan
Greg Egan (born 20 August 1961) is an Australian science fiction writer and amateur mathematician, best known for his works of hard science fiction. Egan has won multiple awards including the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the Hugo Award, and the Locus Award. Life and work Egan holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics from the University of Western Australia. He published his first work in 1983. He specialises in hard science fiction stories with mathematical and quantum ontology themes, including the nature of consciousness. Other themes include genetics, simulated reality, posthumanism, mind uploading, sexuality, artificial intelligence, and the superiority of rational naturalism to religion. He often deals with complex technical material, like new physics and epistemology. He is a Hugo Award winner (with eight other works shortlisted for the Hugos) and has also won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. His early stories featur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pushing Ice
''Pushing Ice'' is a 2005 science fiction novel by Welsh author Alastair Reynolds. According to Reynolds' Web site, the story takes place in a different universe from his Revelation Space stories. Plot summary ''Pushing Ice'' begins in the distant future, where the elected rulers of the "Congress of the Lindblad Ring" gather to decide on a suitable ceremony to honour a woman they consider responsible for the technological advancement and territorial expansion of the future human race, Bella Lind. To explain her role, the chronology is then pushed back to the early days of humanity's crewed exploration of the Solar System, where it is explained that Lind is the captain of the ''Rockhopper,'' a spacecraft used for mining cometary ice. While on a routine mission, Lind is informed that Saturn's moon Janus In ancient Roman religion and myth, Janus ( ; la, Ianvs ) is the god of beginnings, gates, transitions, time, duality, doorways, passages, frames, and endings. He is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rydberg Atom
A Rydberg atom is an excited atom with one or more electrons that have a very high principal quantum number, ''n''. The higher the value of ''n'', the farther the electron is from the nucleus, on average. Rydberg atoms have a number of peculiar properties including an exaggerated response to electric and magnetic fields, long decay periods and electron wavefunctions that approximate, under some conditions, classical orbits of electrons about the nuclei. The core electrons shield the outer electron from the electric field of the nucleus such that, from a distance, the electric potential looks identical to that experienced by the electron in a hydrogen atom. In spite of its shortcomings, the Bohr model of the atom is useful in explaining these properties. Classically, an electron in a circular orbit of radius ''r'', about a hydrogen nucleus of charge +'' e'', obeys Newton's second law: : \mathbf=m\mathbf \Rightarrow = where ''k'' = 1/(4π ε0). Orbital momentum is quantiz ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Strong Interaction
The strong interaction or strong force is a fundamental interaction that confines quarks into proton, neutron, and other hadron particles. The strong interaction also binds neutrons and protons to create atomic nuclei, where it is called the nuclear force. Most of the mass of a common proton or neutron is the result of the strong interaction energy; the individual quarks provide only about 1% of the mass of a proton. At the range of 10−15 m (slightly more than the radius of a nucleon), the strong force is approximately 100 times as strong as electromagnetism, 106 times as strong as the weak interaction, and 1038 times as strong as gravitation. The strong interaction is observable at two ranges and mediated by two force carriers. On a larger scale (of about 1 to 3 fm), it is the force (carried by mesons) that binds protons and neutrons (nucleons) together to form the nucleus of an atom. On the smaller scale (less than about 0.8 fm, the radius of a nucl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Forward
Robert Lull Forward (August 15, 1932 – September 21, 2002) was an American physicist and science fiction writer. His literary work was noted for its scientific credibility and use of ideas developed from his career as an aerospace engineer. He also made important contributions to gravitational wave detection research. Biography Forward earned his doctorate from the University of Maryland in 1965, with a thesis entitled ''Detectors for Dynamic Gravitational Fields'', for the development of a bar antenna for the detection of gravitational radiation. Career and research He then went to work at the research labs of Hughes Aircraft, where he continued his research on gravity measurement and received 18 patents. He took early retirement in 1987, to focus on his fiction writing and consulting for such clients as NASA and the U.S. Air Force. In 1994, he co-founded the company Tethers Unlimited, Inc. with Robert P. Hoyt, where he served as Chief Scientist and Chairman until 2002. M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
